i^ 




t^^: ^ n ^ fA 



HOW NEW YORK CITY 



IS 



GOYERNED 



PT 



JAMES'^PARTON. 



[reprinted from the north AMERICAN REVIEW.] 



^^^^^^^ 




" BOSTON: 
TICKNOR AND FIELDS 

1866. 



FU 



-Tz'1 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by 

TICK NOR AND FIELDS, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. 



University Press : Welch, Bigei.ow, & Co.; 

Cambridge. 



u THE GOVERNMENT OF THE CITY OF 
^ NEW YORK. 



1. Manual of the Corporation of the City of New York. By 
D. T. Valentine. From 1841 to 1865. Prepared and 
published at the Expense of the City. 

2. Documents of the Board of Aldermen of the City of New 
York. From No. 45 to No. 64. McSpedon and Baker. 
1854. 

3. Annual Reports of the Comptroller, exhibiting the Receipts 
and Expenditures of the County Government. The New 
York Printing Company. 1864 and 1865. 

4. Report of the Citizens' Association. New York : George 
F. Nesbitt & Co. 1865. 

5. Wholesale Corruption. Sale of Situations in Fourth Ward 
Si^hools. Report of the Committee appointed by the Board of 
Education. Published by the Citizens' Association of New 
York. 1866. 

6. One Job of the Conspirators who govern our City. Pub- 
lished by the Citizens' Association of New York. 1866. 

7. Clean Streets for Three Hundred Thousand Dollars a Year. 
By D. D. Badger. Published by the Citizens' Association 
of New York. 1866. 

8. Work is King. A Word with ]Vorkingmen in Regard to 
their Interest in good City Government. Published by the 
Citizens' Association of New York. 1866. 

9. Who pays for the Stealings ? The Workingman ! Pub- 
lished by the Citizens' Association of New York. 1864. 

10. A few Questions for Workingmen to think of ■ Published 
by the Citizens' Association of New York. 1865. 

11. Improved Dwellings for the Industrial Classes. A Plea 
for the Wives and Mothers. Published by the Citizens' As- 
sociation of New York. 1866. 

12. City Finances. Items of Expenditure for Stationery and 



4 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

Printing. Published by the Citizens' Association of New 
York. 18G6. 

13. Items of Abuse in the Government oftlie City of New York. 
Published by the Citizens' Association of New York. 1866. 

14. Report of the Executive Council to the Honorary Council 
of the Citizens' Association of Neio York. 1866. 

15. Analysis of the proposed fax Levy for the City and County 
of New York for the Year 1866. Published by the Citizens' 
Association of New York. 

16. Important Reform Measures passed by the Legislature of 
1866. Published by the Citizens' Association of New York. 

17. An Appeal by the Citizens' Association of New York against 
the Abuses of the Local Governme?it, to the Legislature of the . 
State of New York, and to the Public. 1866. 

18. Communication to the Commissioners of the Central Park. 
By Andrew H. Green, Comptroller of the Park. New 
York : Bryant & Co. 1866. 

19. Petition to the Market Committees of the Boards of Alder- 
men and Councilmen of the City of Neiv York. By Thomas 
F. De Voe, Butcher, No. 8 Jefferson Market. Published 
for the Author. 1855. 

On certain conditions, a very large proportion of the whole 
human race will steal. The opportunity must be good, of 
course, and the chance of detection small ; the stealing must 
easily admit of being called by another name ; and, above all, 
the theft must be of such a nature that the thief does not wit- 
ness the pain which the loss of the stolen property occasions. 
On these conditions, almost all children and other immature 
persons, as well as a great number of average honest men and 
women, will steal. One proof of the civilizing power which 
the late Horace Mann excercised over the pupils of Antiocli 
College in Ohio was, that no depredations were committed by 
those raw lads upon the orchards and gardens of the neighbor- 
hood. Mrs. Mann is justified in mentioning this fact as one 
that does honor to the memory of her husband ; for the boy 
who steals apples from an orchard usually has an excellent op- 
portunity and seldom has the slightest sense of doing an in- 
jury to the owner. He takes a handkerchief full from an un- 
seen pei-son, who has whole acres strewn with fruit and trees 
bending with the weight of it, and who will never know that 
particular loss. If the stolen property presented itself in its 
ultimate form, — a piece of bread and butter going into the 
mouth of one of the farmer's little children, — not one boy in 
ten thousand would steal a crumb of it ; but so long as it is 
mere apples lying in an orchard, all boys will steal it'^without 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 5 

compunction/unless they have been exceptionally well bred or 
taught. 

Well-informed persons, who have been officially obliged to 
consider the matter, assure us that a majority of car-conductors, 
omnibus-drivers, and all other takers of unrecorded and un- 
traceable money, are habitual thieves in all countries. It is 
the constant study of able managers to arrange a system that 
shall remove a temptation which experience has shown to be 
generally irresistible. Our fair readers, if we are so happy as 
to have any for so repulsive a subject, are acquainted with a 
class of active little mortals, — the cash-boys of our large dry- 
goods stores. Cash-boys had never appeared on earth if clerks 
had never stolen. But we need not multiply examples. The 
self-knowledge of the most honest men suffices. Who has not 
observed the unwillingness of persons of tried and punctilious 
integrity to put themselves in the way of temptation ? It is 
because those know most of the moral weakness of men who 
have converted that weakness into strength. How often have 
we admired the exquisite modesty of Benjamin Franklin in that 
passage, written when he was an old man, in which he attrib- 
utes the honesty of his early life to the fact that his trade 
brought him in such " plentiful supplies " of money that he 
had little temptation to do wrong. This was not a confession 
in the " high-toned " style, but that is the way honest men feel 
who know themselves. 

We have undertaken to write something about the govern- 
ment of the city of New York, and yet we have fallen intp a 
discourse upon stealing. The reason is, that, after having 
spent several weeks in investigating our subject, we find that 
we have been employed in nothing else but discovering in how 
many ways, and under what a variety of names and pretexts, 
immature and greedy men steal from that fruitful and ill-fenced 
orchard, the city treasury. 

That the government of the city of New York has had, for 
several years past, an exceedingly bad name in the world, is 
probably known to all our readers. It has fallen into com- 
plete contempt. It is a dishonor to belong to it. Persons of 
good repute do not willingly associate with the rulers of the 
city, unless they are known to be of the small number who 
hold their offices for the purpose of frustrating iniquitous 
schemes. When it was found, last winter, that the Aldermen 
and Councilmen (5f the city must necessarily attend the ball of 
the Seventh Regiment at the Academy of Music, many re- 
spectable persons who had bought tickets sold them agam, 
rather than jostle those magnates. The Rev. Henry Ward 
Beecher recently said, in the pulpit, that perhaps the govern- 



6 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

ment of the city of New York did more moral harm to the 
people of New York than all the churches together did good. 
Nevertheless, since we are all disposed to exafrgerate evils 
vaguely known, and since the cry of corruption is habitually 
raised by corrupt men for purposes of intimidation or revenge, 
we entered upon our task fully prepared to find the affairs of the 
city less corruptly administered than they are supposed to be. 
It is an old remark, that good people are not quite as good, 
nor bad people as bad, as popular rumor gives them out. 

It occurred to us that perhaps the best way of beginning an 
investigation of the city government would be to go down to 
the City Hall and look at'it. It proved not to be there.^ To 
keep the whole city from falling a prey to the monster, it has 
been gradually cut to pieces, and scattered over the island ; 
but, like the reptiles whose severed fragments become each a 
perfect creature, with maw as spacious and appetite as keen as 
the original worm, so each portion of the divided system 
is now a self-operating and independent apparatus. In the 
City Hall, however, the legislature of the city still assembles. 
It consists of two honorable bodies, — the Board of Aldermen, 
seventeen in number, elected for two years, and the Board of 
Councilmen, twenty-four in number, elected for one year, — 
each member of both boards receiving a salary of two thousand 
dollars a year. Considering that they meet but twice a week, 
always in the afternoon, and that the session averages one 
hour's duration, these gentlemen cannot be said to be ill paid. 
They are compensated for their valuable services at twice the 
rate at which the labors of the Chief Justice of the Supreme 
Court of the United States are rewarded. But then it costs 
those city legislators something to be elected. The legitimate 
expenses of an election to either of the boards amount to about 
three hundred dollars ; but many a candidate expends a thou- 
sand dollars of his own money and several hundred dollars of 
other people's. 

It is to the Chamber of the Board of Councilmen that we 
beg first to invite the courteous reader. This apartment being 
in the second story of the building, we pass many open doors 
on our way to it, through which we see idle men with their 
feet upon tables, smoking cigars. There are few buildings in 
the world, probably, wherein the consumption of tobacco in all 
its forms goes on more vigorously during business hours than 
the City Hall of New York. Smoke comes in clouds from many 
rooms, and the vessel which Mr. Thackeray used to call the 
" expectoratoon " is everywhere seen. If we enter the Coun- 
cilmen's Chamber a few minutes before the time of beginning 
the session, we observe many members smoking ; and as soon 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 7 

as there is a prospect of an adjournment, the same gentlemen 
begin to fondle their cigars, to hand them about, or even toss 
them to one another, so that when the adjournment does take 
place not a moment may be lost. Twice we have seen a 
member light his cigar before an adjournment was carried. 
The very clerks of this " honorable body " write out their notes 
of the proceedings smoking cigars of a flavor beyond that 
which the pursuit of literature allows. 

The Councilraen's Chamber, a lofty and spacious room, pro- 
vided by the liberal forethought of honest and public-spirited 
men sixty years ago, is furnished with preposterous magnifi- 
cence ; not " regardless of expense," however, as some have 
inconsiderately alleged. On the contrary, expense was evi- 
dently the first object sought by the persons who had the work 
in charge ; and, accordingly, wherever a thousand-dollar thing 
could be put, there you behold it. The apartment is arranged 
on the plan of the Representatives' Chamber in the Capitol at 
Washinc^ton. The President sits aloft, in a richly canopied 
recess ; below him are four clerks in a row ; the members sit 
in two semicircles, in chairs of the most massive mahogany, 
at desks of solid elegance. The windows are shaded by cur- 
tains heavy with expense, and the carpet is thick with it. In 
case the session, which begins at 2 P. M., should chance to 
prolong itself to the evening, there is a chandelier of the most 
elaborate and ramified description, such as would rejoice the 
heart of any contractor to furnish. To remind members, who 
all have gold watches, of the passage of time, there is a clock 
of vast size, splendid with gilt and carving. Four staring, full- 
length portraits of Fillmore, Clay, Young, and Hamilton Fish 
disfigure the walls, and the father of his country looks coldly 
down upon the scene in marble. He never had such furniture 
either at Mount Vernon or at Philadelphia, nor did he ever see 
such at Independence Hall. The ceiling is frescoed, and a great 
gilt eagle spreads his wings over the President's canopy. Be- 
sides this gorgeous apartment, the Councilmen have a large 
and handsomely furnished room for their clerks and books, 
and a private room, densely carpeted, for themselves, where 
there is a wardrobe for each member's overcoat and umbrella. 
These wardrobes are very properly provided with lock and 
key. 

To asssist this " honorable body " in the business of legislation, 
there is a "chief clerk," whose salary is $ 3,000 a year ; there 
is a " deputy clerk," at $ 2,000 a year ; there is a " first assist- 
ant clerk," at $1,500 a year; there is a "second assistant 
clerk," at the same ; there is a " general clerk," at S 1 ,200 a 
year ; there is an " engrossing clerk," at $ 1,250 a year ; there 



8 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

is a " sergeant-at-arms," at $ 1,200 a year ; there is a ''reader," 
at the same ; there is a "door-keeper," at % 750 a year ; there 
is a "messenger," at $1,200 a year; and there is an "as- 
sistant messenger," at S 1,100 a year. In short, there is not a 
leo-islative body in the world more completely provided with all 
external aids and appliances for the work in hand than the Hon- 
orable the Board of Council men of the City of New York. To 
the salaries of these officers the Councilmen add, in the form of 
gifts for " extra services," six or seven thousand dollars more, 
and they bestow upon the reporters of seventeen newspapers, 
for not reporting their proceedings, two hundred dollars a year 
each. Perhaps the clerks also are paid for not doing their 
duty, — if any duty can be found for so many, — for we were 
present in the chamber, last June, when a communication from 
the Mayor was read, in which he complained that bills came to 
him for approval so badly written that he could scarcely read 
them, and declaring that hereafter he would pay no attention 
to acts not properly engrossed. 

The twenty-four Councilmen who have provided themselves 
with such ample assistance at such costly accommodation are 
mostly very young men, — the majority appear to be under 
thirty. Does the reader remember the pleasant description 
given by Mr. Hawthorne of the sprightly young bar-keeper 
who rainbows the glittering drink so dexterously from one 
tumbler to another ? That sprightly young bar-keeper might 
stand as the type of the young men composing this board. 
There are respectable men in the body. There are six who 
have never knowingly cast an improper vote. There is one 
respectable physician, three lawyers, ten mechanics, and only 
four who acknowledge to be dealers in liquors. But there is 
a certain air about most of these young Councilmen which, in 
the eyes of a New-Yorker, stamps them as belonging to what 
has been styled of late years "our ruling class," — butcher- 
boys who have got into politics, bar-keepers who have taken a 
leading part in primary ward meetings, and young fellows who 
hang about engine-houses and billiard-rooms. A stranger 
would naturally expect to find in such a board men who have 
shown ability and acquired distinction in private business. 
We say, again, that there are honest and estimable men in the 
body ; but we also assert, that there is not an individual in it 
who has attained any considerable rank in the vocation which 
he professes. If we were to print the list here, not a name 
would be generally recognized. Honest Christopher Pullman, 
for example, who leads the honest minority of six that vainly 
oppose every scheme of plunder, is a young man of twenty- 
seven, just beginning business as a cabinet-maker. Honest 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 9 

William B. White, another of the six, is the manager of a 
printing-office. Honest Stephen Roberts is a sturdy smith, 
who has a shop near a wharf for repairing the iron- work of 
ships. Morris A. Tyng, another of the honest six, is a young 
lawyer getting into practice. We make no remark upon these 
facts, being only desirous to show the business standing of the 
men to whom the citizens of New York have confided the 
spending of sundry millions per annum. The majority of this 
board are about equal, in point of experience and ability, to 
the management of an oyster-stand in a market. Such ex- 
pressions as " them laws," " sot the table," " 71st rigment," and 
" them arguments is played out," may be heard on almost any 
Monday or Thursday afternoon, between two and three o'clock, 
in this sumptuous chamber. 

But what most strikes and puzzles the stranger is the crowd 
of spectators outside the railing. It is the rogues' gallery 
come to life, with here and there an honest-looking laborer 
wearing the garments of his calling. We attended six ses- 
sions of this " honorable body," and on every occasion there 
was the same kind of crowd looking on, who sat the session 
out. Frequently we observed looks and words of recognition 
pass between the members and this curious audience ; and, 
once, we saw a member gayly toss a paper of tobacco to one 
of them, who cauglit it with pleasing dexterity. We are un- 
able to explain the regular presence of this great number of 
the unornamental portion of our fellow-beings, since we could 
never see any indications that any of the crowd had an inter- 
est in the proceedings. As the debates are never reported by 
any one of the seventeen reporters who are paid two hundred 
dollars a year for not doing it, and as the educated portion of 
the community never attend the sessions, this board sits, prac- 
tically, with closed doors. Their schemes are both conceived 
and executed in secrecy, though the door is open to all who 
wish to enter. This is the more surprising, because almost 
every session of the board furnishes the material for a report, 
which an able and public-spirited journalist would gladly buy 
at the highest price paid for such work in any city. 

Debates is a ludicrous word to apply to the proceedings of 
the Councilmen. Most of the business done by them is pushed 
through without the slighest discussion, and is of such a nature 
that members cannot be prepared to discuss it. The most 
reckless haste marks every part of the performance. A mem- 
ber proposes that certain lots be provided with curbstones ; 
another, that a free drinking hydrant be placed on a certain 
corner five miles up town ; and another, that certain blocks of 
a distant street be paved with Belgian pavement. Respecting 
1* 



10 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

the utility of these works, members generally know nothing 
and can say nothing; nor are they proper objects of legisla- 
tion. The resolutions are adopted, usually, without a word of 
explanation, and at a speed that must be seen to be appreci- 
ated. The first and last impression made upon a disinterested 
spectator is, that this most expensive body, even if every 
member were an honest man, would be absolutely useless. A 
competent street inspector, properly aided by the police, could 
do all the real work that is left to them to do ; for such has 
been the flagrant abuse of their power, that, by degrees, they 
have been deprived by the State Legislature of a great part 
of the authority they once possessed; but the power to do 
mischief remains. This " honorable body " can still waste, 
give away, and steal the money of their constituents. 

The only Avay in which we can convey to the reader's mind 
a lively idea of the character of the city legislature is to relate, 
as simply as possible, a few of their acts of last summer, which 
we witnessed ourselves and recorded on the day of their per- 
petration. There is no "mystery of iniquity" in the business; 
to understand the game which the majority of this body are 
playing, it is only necessary to sit out two or three of their 
ordinary sessions. We own it is a trial to the patience. There 
will be moments when a person of vivacious turn of mind will 
feel an almost irresistible impulse to throw something at the 
head of those insolent young bar-keepers, who have contrived 
to get their hands into the public pocket, and are scattering 
wide the hard-earned money of good citizens and faithful 
fathers of families. 

At almost every session we witnessed scenes like the follow- 
ing. A member proposed to lease a certain building for a city 
court at two thousand dollars a year for ten years. Honest 
Christopher Pullman, a faithful and laborious public servant, 
objected on one or two grounds; — first, rents being unnatu- 
rally high, owing to several well-known and temporary causes, 
it would be unjust to the city to fix the rent at present rates for 
so long a period; secondly, he had been himself to see the 
building, had taken pains to inform himself as to its value, and 
was prepared to prove that twelve hundred dollars a year was 
a proper rent for it, even at the inflated rates. He made this 
statement with excellent brevity, moderation, and good temper, 
and concluded by moving that the term be two instead of ten 
years. A robust young man with a bull-neck and of ungram- 
matical habits said, in a tone expressive of impatient disdain, 
that the landlord of the building had " refused " fifteen hun- 
dred dollars a year for it. " Question ! " " Question ! " shouted 
half a dozen angry voices. The question was instantly put, 



CITY OF NEW YORK. n 

when a perfect war of noes voted down Mr. Pullman's amend- 
ment. Another hearty chorus of ayes consummated the iniquit}'. 
In all such affairs, the visitor notices a kind of ungovernable 
propensity to vote for spending money, and a prompt disgust 
at any obstacle raised or objection made. The bull-necked 
Councilman of uncertain grammar evidently felt that Mr. Pull- 
man's modest interference on behalf of the tax-payer was a 
most gross impertinence. He felt himself an injured being, and 
his companions shared his indignation. 

We proceed to another and better specimen. A resolution, 
was introduced, appropriating four thousand dollars for the 
purpose of presenting stands of colors to five regiments of city 
militia, which were named, each stand to cost eight hundred 
dollars. Mr. Pullman, as usual, objected, and we beg the reader 
to mark his objections. He said that he was a member of the 
committee which had reported the resolution, but he had never 
beard of it till that moment ; the scheme had been " sprung " 
upon him. The chairman of the committee replied to this, 
that, since the other regiments had had colors given them by 
the city, he did not suppose that any one could object to these 
remaining five receiving the same compliment, and therefore 
he had not thought it worth while to summon the gentleman. 
" Besides," said he, " it is a small matter anyhow " ; — by which 
he evidently meant to intimate that the objector was a very 
small person. To this last remark, a member replied, that he 
did not consider four thousand dollars so very small a matter. 
" Anyhow," he added, " we oughter save the city every dollar 
we kin." Mr. Pullman resumed. He stated that the Legis- 
lature of the State, several months before, had voted a stand 
of colors to each infantry regiment in the State ; that the dis- 
tribution of these colors had already begun ; that the five regi- 
ments would soon receive them ; and that, consequently, there 
was no need of their having the colors which it was now pro- 
posed to give them. A member roughly replied, that the colors 
voted by the State Legislature were mere painted banners, 
" of no account." Mr. Pullman denied this. " I am," said he, 
" captain in one of our city regiments. Two weeks ago we 
received our colors. I have seen, felt, examined, and marched 
under them ; and I can testify ihat they are of great beauty, 
and excellent quality, made by Tiffimy and Company, a firm 
of the first standing in the city." He proceeded to describe 
the colors as being made of the best silk, and decorated in the 
most elegant manner. He further objected to the price pro- 
posed to be given for the colors. He declared that, from his 
connection with the militia, he had become acquainted with 
the value of such articles, and he could procure colore of the 



12 THE GOVERNMENT OF TEE 

best kind ever used in the service for three hundred and sev- 
enty-five dollars. The price named in the resolution was, 
therefore, most excessive. Upon this, another member rose 
and said, in a peculiarly offensive manner, that it would be 
two years before Tiffany and Company had made all the col- 
ors, and some of the regiments would have to wait all that 
time. " The other regiments," said he, " have had colors pre- . 
sented by the city, and I don't see why we should show par- ' 
tiality." Whereupon Mr. Pullman informed the board that ' 
the city regiments would all be supplied in a few weeks ; and, ' 
even if they did have to wait awhile, it was of no conse- 
quence, for they all had very good colors already. Honest 
Stephen Roberts then rose, and said that this was a subject 
with which he was not acquainted, but that if no one could 
refute what Mr. Pullman had said, he should be obliged to 
vote against the resolution. 

Then there was a pause. The cry of " Question ! " was 
heard. The ayes and noes were called. The resolution was car- 
ried by eighteen to five. The learned suppose that one half of 
this stolen four thousand dollars was expended upon the colors, 
and the other half divided among about forty persons. It 
is conjectured that each member of the Councilmen's Ring, 
which consists of thirteen, received about forty dollars for his 
vote on this occasion. This sum added to his pay, which is 
twenty dollars per session, made a tolerable afternoon's work. 

Any one witnessing this scene would certainly have sup- 
posed that now the militia regiments of the city of New York 
were provided with colors. What was our surprise to hear, a 
few days after, a member gravely propose to appropriate eight 
hundred dollars for the purpose of presenting the Ninth Reg- 
iment of New York Infantry with a stand of colors. Mr. 
Pullman repeated his objections, and recounted anew the gen- 
erosity of the State Legislature. The eighteen, without a 
word of reply, voted for the grant as before. It so chanced 
that, on our way up Broadway, an hour after, we met that 
very regiment marching down with its colors flying ; and we 
observed that those colors were nearly new. Indeed, there is 
such a propensity in the public to present colors to popular i 
regiments, that some of them have as many as five stands, of i 
various degrees of splendor. There is nothing about which ' 
Councilmen need feel so little anxiety as a deficiency in the | 
supply of regimental colors. When, at last, these extravagant 
banners voted by the Corporation are presented to the regi- 
ments, a new scene of plunder is exhibited. The officers of 
the favored regiment are invited to a room in the basement 
of the City Hall, where city officials assist them to consume 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 1 3 

three hundred dollars' worth of champagne, sandwiches, and 
cold chicken, — paid for out of the city treasury, — while the 
privates of the regiment await the return of their officers in 
the unshaded portion of the adjacent park. 

It is a favorite trick with these Councilmen, as of all pohti- 
cians, to devise measures the passage of which will gratify- 
large bodies of voters. This is one of tlie advantages pro- 
posed to be gained by the presentation of colors to regiments, 
and the same system is pursued with regard to churches and 
societies. At every one of the six sessions of the Councilmen 
which we attended, resolutions were introduced to give away 
the people's money to wealthy organizations. A church, for 
example, is assessed a thousand dollars for the construction of 
a sewer, which enhances the value of the church property by 
at least the amount of the assessment. Straightway a member 
from that neighborhood proposes to console the stricken church 
with a " donation " of a thousand dollars to enable it to pay 
the assessment ; and as this is a proposition to vote money, it 
is can'ied as a matter of course. We select from our notes 
only one of these donating scenes. A member proposed to 
give two thousand dollai-s to a certain industrial school, — the 
favorite charity of the present time, to which all the benevo- 
lent most willingly subscribe. Vigilant Christopher Pullman 
reminded the board that it was now unlawful for the Corpo- 
ration to vote money for any object not specified in the tax 
levy, as finally sanctioned by the Legislature. He read the 
section of the act which forbade it. He further showed, from 
a statement by the Comptroller, that there was no money left 
at their disposal for any miscellaneous objects, since the appro- 
priation for " City contingencies " was exhausted. The only 
reply to his remarks was the instant passage of the resolution 
by eighteen to five. By what artifice the law is likely to be 
evaded in such cases, we may show further on. In all proba- 
bility, the industrial school, in the course of the year, will re- 
ceive a fraction of this money, perhaps even so large a fraction 
as one half. It may be that, ere now, some obliging person 
about the City Hall has offered to buy the claim for a thousand 
dollars, and take the risk of the hocus-pocus necessary for 
getting it, — which to Mm is no risk at all. 

It was proposed, on another occasion, to raise the fees of the 
inspectors of weights and measures, who received fifty cents for 
inspecting a pair of platform scales, and smaller sums for scales 
and measures of less importance. Here was a subject upon 
which honest Stephen Roberts, whose shop is in a street where 
scales and measures abound, was entirely at home. He show- 
ed, in his sturdy and strenuous manner, that, at the rates then 



H 



THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 



established, an active man could make two hundred dollars a 
day. " Why," said he, " a man can inspect, and does inspect, 
fifty platform scales in an hour." The cry of " Question ! " 
arose. The question was put, and the usual loud chorus of 
ayes followed. 

As it requires a three-fourths vote to grant money, — i. e. 
eighteen members, — it is sometimes impossible for the Ring 
to get that number together. There is a mode of preventing 
the absence or the opposition of members from defeating fa- 
vorite schemes. It is by way of " reconsideration." The time 
was, when a measure distinctly voted down by a lawful ma- 
jority was dead ; but by this expedient the voting down of a 
measure is only equivalent to its postponement to a more fa- 
vorable occasion. The moment the chairman pronounces a 
resolution lost, the member who has it in charge moves a re- 
consideration ; and, as a reconsideration only requires the 
vote of a majority, tfds is invariably carried. By a rule of the 
Board, a reconsideration carries a measure over to a future 
meeting, — to any future meeting which may afford a prospect 
to its passage. The member who is engineering it watches his 
chance, labors with faltering members out of doors, and, as 
often as he thinks he can carry it, calls it up again, until at 
last the requisite eighteen are obtained. It has frequently 
happened that a member has kept a measure in a state of re- 
consideration for months at a time, waiting for the happy mo- 
ment to arrive. There was a robust young Councilman who 
had a benevolent project in charge, of payinf^ nine hundred 
dollars for a hackney-coach and two horses which a drunken 
driver drove over the dock into the river one cold night 
last winter. There was some disagreement in the Ring on 
this measure, and the robust youth was compelled to move for 
many reconsiderations. So, also, it was long before the wires 
could be all arranged to admit of the appointment of a " mes- 
senger " to the City Librarian, who has perhaps less to do 
than any man in New York who is paid eighteen hundred dol- 
lars a year ; but perseverance meets its reward. We hear 
that this messenger is now smoking in the City Hall at a sal- 
ary of fifteen hundred dollars. 

There is a manoeuvre also for preventing the attendance of 
obnoxious, obstructive members, like the honest six, which is 
ingenious and effective. A " special meeting " is called. The 
law declares that notice of a special meeting must be lefl at 
the residence or the place of business of every member. Mr. 
Roberts's residence and Mr. Roberts's place of business are 
eight miles apart, and he leaves his home for the day before 
nine in the morning. If Mr. Roberts's presence at a special 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 1 5 

meeting at 2 P. M. is desired, the notice is left at his shop in 
the morning. If it is not desired, the notice is sent to his house 
in Harlem, after he has left it. Mr. Pullman, cabinet-maker, 
leaves his shop at noon, goes home to dinner, and returns soon 
after one. If his presence at the special meeting at 2 P. M. is 
desired, the notice is left at his house the evening before, or 
at his shop in the morning. If his presence is not desired, the 
notice is left at his shop a few minutes after twelve, or at his 
house a few minutes past one. In either case, he receives the 
notice too late to reach the City Hall in time. We were 
present in the Councilmeu's Chamber when Mr. Pullman 
stated this incoiwenience^ assuming that it was accidental, and 
offered an amendment to the rule, requiring notice to be left 
five hoiu-s before the time named for the meeting. Mr. 
Roberts also gave his experience in the matter of notices, and 
both gentlemen spoke with perfect moderation and good 
temper. We wish we could convey to our readers an idea of 
the brutal insolence with which Mr. Pullman, on this occasion, 
was snubbed and defrauded by a young bar-keeper who 
chanced to be in the chair. But this would be impossible 
without relating the scene at very great length. The 
amendment proposed was voted down with that peculiar roar 
of noes which is always heard in that chamber when some 
honest man attempts to put an obstacle in the way of the free 
plunder of his fellow-citizens. 

These half-fledged legislators are acquainted with the device 
known by the name of the " previous question." We witnessed 
a striking proof of this. One of the most audacious and inso- 
lent of the Ring introduced a resolution, vaguely worded, the 
object of which was to annul an old paving contract that 
would not pay at the present cost of labor and materials, and 
to authorize a new contract at higher rates. Before the clerk 
had finished reading the resolution, honest Stephen Roberts 
sprang to his feet, and, unrolling a remonstrance with several 
yards of signatures appended to it, stood, with his eye upon the 
chairman, ready to present it the moment the reading was 
concluded. This remonstrance, be it observed, was signed by 
a majority of the property-owners interested, — the men who 
would be assessed to pay for one half of the proposed pavement. 
Fancy the impetuous Roberts with the document held aloft, 
the yards of signatures streaming down to his feet and flowiqg 
far under his desk, awaiting the time when it would be in 
order for him to cry out, "Mr. President." The reading 
ceased. Two voices were heard, shouting, " Mr. President." 
It was not to Mr. Roberts that an impartial chairman could 
assicrn the floor. The member who introduced the resolution 



l5 TUE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

was the one who "caught the speaker's eye," and that 
member, Ibrewarned of Mr. Roberts's intention, moved the 
previous question. It was in vain that Mr. Roberts shouted, 
" Mr. President." It was in vain that he fluttered and rattled 
his streaming ribbon of blotted paper. The President could 
not hear a word of any kind until a vote had been taken upon 
the question whether the main question should be now put. 
That question was carried in the affirmative by a chorus of 
ayes^ so exactly timed that it was like the voice of one man. 
Then the main question was put, and it was carried by an- 
other emphatic and simultaneous shout. 

We have spoken of the headlong precipitation with which 
all business is done in this board. Measures involving an ex- 
penditure of millions, and designed to bind the city for a 
great number of years, are hurried through both boards in less 
time than jyaterfamilias expends in buying his Sunday dinner 
in the market; and, fi-equently, such measures are so mys- 
teriously worded that no one outside of the Ring can under- 
stand their real object. We happened to be present when a 
resolution was brought directly from the Board of Aldermen 
(who had passed it without debate), directing the Street 
Commissioner to make a contract with the lowest bidder for 
lighting the whole island for twenty years with gas, — the 
price to be fixed now, when coal and labor are twice their 
usual price. No such simple words, however, as twenty years 
were to be found in the resolution ; which merely said, that the 
contract should be for " the same number of years as the con- 
tract last made and executed with the Manhattan Gas Com- 
pany." A member, bewildered by the furiously rapid reading 
of this long and vague resolution, timidly inquired how many 
years that was. No one seemed to know. After a pause, 
some one said that he believed it was ten years. Whereupon, 
Councilman White, a faithful and intelligent member of 
the honest minority, proposed that the term of the contract be 
two years, which Mr. Pullman supported. The amendment 
was instantly voted down, and the original resolution was 
carried by the usual eighteen votes. The Mayor promptly 
vetoed the scheme. The Tribune thundered against it ; but 
the veto message had no sooner been read, than it was passed 
over the veto by the Aldermen ; then taken to the Council- 
men's Chamber, where the requisite eighteen votes were imme- 
diately cast for it. This resolution, as we were afterwards 
informed, was merely one of a long series of measures designed 
to tap the lamp-posts of the city, like so many sugar-maples, 
and make them run gold into the troughs of a few notorious 
politicians. 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 17 

We are lingering too long in the Councilmen's Chamber, 
and must abruptly leave It. Nor can we remain more than a 
moment Vv'ith the Aldermen. It is not necessary, for there is 
not a pin to choose between the two bodies. We observe in 
their chamber the same lavishness of furnitui-e and decoration ; 
pictures as numerous and as bad as those which hang in the 
chamber opposite ; the same wild profusion of clerks, assistant- 
clerks, readers, engrossers, messengers, and assistant-messen- 
gers ; the same crowd of unwashed and ugly spectators outside 
the railing. Except that the Aldermen are a little older and 
somewhat better dressed than the Councilmen, we could dis- 
cern no dilFerence between them. Whatever dubious scheme 
is hurried through one body is rushed through the other. 
Sometimes the Councilmen point the game, and the Aldermen 
bring it down ; and sometimes it is the Aldermen that start up 
the covey, and the Councilmen that fire. As with the Council- 
men, so with the Aldermen, there is a sure three-fourths vote 
for every scheme which has the sanction of the interior circle 
who control the entire politics of the city. And, as among the 
Councilmen, so among the Aldermen there are a few honest 
and public-spirited men who vainly protest against iniquity, or 
silently cast their votes against it. If one such body is one too 
many, how shall we express the enormous superfluity of two ? 
It is impossible. 

But there is a third legislative board sitting in the City Hall. 
The island upon which New York is built is a county, and that 
county has its board of twelve Supervisors, who have the spend- 
ing of seventeen millions of dollars per annum. The city and 
the county cover the same territory. Each creature in the 
island of Manhattan lives both in the county and in the city of 
New York. The existence, therefore, of a separate legislature 
for each is a complete absurdity ; and, if both were honest, there 
would be constant danger of clashing between them. They do 
not often clash, because both have in view the same object, and 
pursue that object under the direction of a central gang, — the 
masters of both. It is the Board of Supervisors who, being 
authorized, eight years ago, to build a court-house at an expense 
not to exceed two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, have ex- 
pended upon it two millions and a half; and there it stands 
to-day just half done. It is computed, by architects profession- 
ally employed, that for every dollar spent upon this unfinished 
edifice another dollar has gone elsewhere. 

Our principal object in this article is not to present the reader 
with a startling catalogue of iniquities, but to endeavor to con- 
tribute our little towards discovering a mode of expelling the 
thieves, keeping them expelled, and getting a few honest men 



1 8 THE GOVERNME^NT OF THE 

in the place of that great multitude of plunderers. Before 
entering upon that part of our subject, however, we must show 
to readers remote from the scene, that the corruption exists, 
that it taints nearly every branch of the public service, that it 
is an evil of gigantic and menacing proportions, and that the 
numerous expedients devised for holding it in check have 
failed. Hitherto we have related what we have ourselves 
seen and heard : we now proceed to glean a few of the more 
striking facts from our notes of what others have told us and 
from printed testimony. 

The volume the title of which may be found at the head of 
this article, " The Manual of the Common Council," is itself a 
curious specimen of the artifices resorted to by these official 
plunderers of the public purse. In the year 1841, a zealous 
assistant clerk to the Common Council conceived the idea of 
publishing a little volume, which should be a kind of city alma- 
nac ; containing, besides what an almanac usually presents, a 
list of all the pereons connected with the city government, 
their places of business and residence, and a map of the city. 
A neat, small volume of 180 pages was the result of his labors. 
Even this was unnecessary, because the most useful part of the 
information which it gave respecting the members of the gov- 
ernment had already appeared in the City Directory, and an 
almanac could be had of pill-venders for nothing. No good 
reason could be given why even so inexpensive a work as that 
should be paid for out of the public treasury. But see to what 
proportions this trilling imposition has since grown. The next 
year, our zealous assistant clerk added to his catalogue of city 
officials a list of all previous members of the Corporation, from 
the earliest period of the city's existence, and a picture of New 
York as it was two hundred years ago. This year the volume 
swelled from 180 to 253 pages. The picture was interesting, 
and caused the work to be much spoken of and sought after, 
which was only another proof how unnecessary it was that it 
should be published at the expense of the city. The next 
issue, besides the list of names and residences, contained exten- 
sive extracts from ancient city records, which increased the 
number of pages to 312. Every year the Manual increased in 
bulk, in the quantity of superfluous matter, in the number and 
costliness of the pictures, until it has now become a manual of 
folly, extravagance, and dishonesty. Let us glance at the 
Manual for 1865; for, to add to the exquisiteness of the art 
employed in its preparation, the book is not published until 
the year is nearly expired, and a new set of oflicers are about 
to be chosen, so that the volume for 1866 had not appeared 
when these lines were Avritten. The Manual for 1805 is a 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 19 

most superb and lavishly illustrated duodecimo volume of 879 
pages. It contains one hundred and forty-one pictures, of all 
degrees of expensiveness, — steel-plate, woodcut, plain lith- 
ograph, and colored lithograph. The large colored map of the 
city, at the beginning, cost as much money as a map of that 
kind could any way be made to cost. Next comes a steel por- 
trait of the person who, for twenty-five years, has hired people 
to compile the annual volume, and whose name has always ap- 
l^eared on the title-page as its editor, and who is supposed to 
be liberally remunerated for his editorial labors. Next appears 
a very elegant colored title-page, containing six finely executed 
})ietures. 

Before proceeding with the list, we remind the reader that 
the ingenuity of the compilers of this work has been severely 
taxed for many yeai-s to devise and discover subjects for illus- 
tration. Subjects that could be called legitimate, or that ap- 
proached the legitimate, having been long ago exhausted, the 
editor this year appears to have been in the direst straits to 
supply his lithographers and engravers with the regular quan- 
tity of work. 

Accordingly, the next illustration is a plan of the Aldermen's 
Chamber, designed to show where each member sat in 1865 ; 
and the next is a four-paged, folding lithograph, containing — 
O precious gift to posterity ! — a fac-simile of each Alderman's 
signature. In the next two plates posterity is blessed with the 
signatures of the Councilmen for 1865, and the means of ascer- 
taining the precise arm-chair occupied by each. The following 
are the subjects of a few of the costly colored lithographs : — 
the " fur store " established in 1820 by the father of the Mayor 
of the city in 1865 ; the " old frame-house " in which the editor 
of the Manual "passed his youth"; "Mr. Stewart's house in 
Fifty-fourth Street " ; " a grocery and tea store " of the year 
1826 ; the house in North Moore Street in which Speaker 
Colfax was born ; " twin frame-houses in Lexington Avenue " ; 
Tammany Hall in 1830 ; a billiard saloon in the Fifth Avenue ; 
Harlem Lane, with fast horses travelling thereon ; the " Audu- 
bon Estate " on the Hudson ; the upper end of the Central 
Park drive. Besides these, there are pictures, not colored, of a 
prodigious number of public and private buildings, and por- 
traits of undistinguished persons. The number of pages occu- 
pied by extracts from old records, newspapers, and memories 
is 423 ! 

Such is the book which the tax-payers of the city are called 
upon every year to pay for, in order to swell the income of 
sundry printers, lithographers, politicians, and the compiler. 
But this is not all. The number of copies annually ordered to 



20 



THE GOVERNMENT OF TEE 



be printed is ten thousand I The number paid for is ten thou- 
sand. The number actually printed, we are positively assured 
by men who are in a position to know, is about three thousand. 
Of this number, about fifteen hundred are distributed gratis 
about the City Hall, and the rest are sold by, and for the ben- 
efit of, the compiler. A considerable number find their way 
into the second-hand bookstores which make Nassau Street so 
fascinating to poor students and rich collectors. We bought 
our copy there, and its price was three dollars. The booksel- 
ler informed us that he laid in his supply of the Manual for 
1865 at two dollars per copy, which is three dollars and thirty- 
six cents less than a copy costs the city. Nor have we yet 
got to the bottom of this enormous "job." We have said 
that the city pays for ten thousand copies of the preposterous 
volume. It pays for nearly twice that number. The items of 
the Manual account rendered for 1865 were these: — 



Bill of engraving . . . . 


. $ 4,353.10 


Bill of engraving and printing . 


. 733.00 


Bill of drawing and printing . 


5,150.00 


Bill of lithographing and printing 


. 3,185.00 


Bill of printing 10,000 copies 


. 27,951.20 


Bill of corrections and alterations 


. 300.00 


Bill of paper for title-pages . 


600.00 


Bill of thirty reams tissue paper 


. 150.00 


Bill of papering 10,000 copies 


100.00 


Bill of ten rean\s wrapping paper 


. ] 50.00 


Bill of binding 5,000 copies in cloth 


5,000.00 


Bill of binding 4,000 copies in muslin 


. 4,000.00 


Bill of binding 1 ,000 copies in morocco 


. 2,000.00 


Total .... 


$ 53,672.30 


D. T. Valentine, for compiling 


3,500.00 


Total .... 


. $57,172.30 



This shamefol account being brought to the notice of the 
present Mayor of the city, Mr. John T. Hofiman, he did him- 
self the honor to veto the resolution authorizing a similar ex- 
penditure for 1866. He told the men who passed that reso- 
lution, that he had made inquiries of such publishing houses 
as the Appletons and the Harpers, and had ascertained that 
ten thousand copies of the work could be manufactured for 
% 30,000, instead of $ 53,672 ; although a new publisher would 
not have the benefit of the large amount of stereotyped mat- 
ter which appears in the Manual from year to year, with little 
alteration. The truth is, that the book actually costs the com- 
piler about S 15,000 per annum ; and the difference between 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 21 

that sum and the amount charged is taken from the pockets 
of the New York tax-payers by a process which we leave our 
readers to characterize with the proper term. 

Tlie most usual manner of stealing is to receive money for 
awarding or procuring contracts, appointments, donations, or 
increase of salaries, which money, of course, the flxvored per- 
son gets back, if he can, from the public treasury ; and he 
usually can. The President of the Board of Health, last 
spring, when New York was threatened with the cholera, had 
occasion to remonstrate "svith a person who held the contract 
for removing dead animals from the streets, and threatened 
him with the breaking of the contract if its conditions were 
not better complied with. " That would be rather hard, Mr. 
Schultz," replied the man, " for that contract cost me S 60,- 
000." And well it might ; for the city pays $ 25,000 a year 
for getting rid of a commodity every pound of which ought to 
yield the city a revenue. A dead horse, worth twenty dol- 
lars, the city pays for having carted oif to where it can be 
conveniently converted into twenty dollars. Another con- 
tractor receives $ 21,000 a year for removing night-soil, which 
could be sold for enough to pay the cost of its removal. By 
various extra charges, the holders of this contract have con- 
tinued to swell their gains incredibly. Mr. Jackson Schultz, 
the energetic and capable President of the Board of Health, 
has recently published his conviction, that the " total swindle 
under this contract is a $ 111,000," and we have had the ad- 
vantage of hearing him demonstrate the fact. The story, 
however, is too long for our very limited space. 

Does any one need evidence that the men who award such 
contracts, in the teeth of opposition and elucidation, receive a 
large share of the plunder ? The fact is as certain as though 
ten witnesses swore to having seen the money to them in hand 
paid. Three years ago a contract was awarded for sweeping 
the streets for ten years, at $ 495,000 a year. Since the ac- 
cession to power of the new Board of Health, responsible men 
have handed in a written offer to buy the remainder of the 
contract for a quarter of a million dollars, i. e. to clean the 
city for seven years at $ 495,000 a year, and give the city a 
quarter of a million dollars for the privilege. There are those 
about the city offices who know, or think tiiey know, how the 
plunder of this contract is divided. We believe we are not 
violating any confidence, expressed or implied, when we say, 
that it is the conviction of the Board of Health that S 100,000 
per annum of the proceeds of this contract are divided among 
certain politicians ; that a certain lawyer, vv'ho engineered the 
project, and stands ready to defend it, receives a salary of 



22 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

% 25,000 per annum as " counsel to the contract " ; and that the 
men in whose name the contract is held are " dummies," who 
get $ 6,000 a year for the use of their names and for their la- 
bor in superintending the work. The contract is further bur- 
dened with the support of several hundred cripples, old men, 
and idle men, all of whom are voters, who are put in the street- 
cleaning force by Aldermen and Councilmen who want their 
votes and the votes of their relatives, thus kindly relieved of 
maintaining aged grandfathers, lame uncles, and lazy good-for- 
nothings. "These statements, we are aware, cannot be proved. 
Such compacts are not trusted to paper ; and a witness driven 
to bay can always balk his assailants by refusing to criminate 
himself. The reader, therefore, may decline to believe these 
details. One thing remains, and is certain, that the working- 
men of New York are annually plundered of two hundred 
thousand dollars per annum by this single contract. 

HoAv the work so munificently paid for is done is sufficiently 
well known. Into that foul subject we cannot enter, except 
to notice the blind devotion of the great mass of poor men who 
annually vote to keep in power the people who steal their 
earnings and poison their children. New York boasts a Dem- 
ocratic majority of more than thirty thousand votes, and the 
government of the city is always in the hands of the party so 
named. Is it, then, the ricli men's streets that are unswept, 
and the poor men's crowded avenues and lanes that are clean V 
Are the small parks and squares where thousands of poor chil- 
dren play better kept than those to which scores of rich men's 
children are carried ? Is the Bowery cleaner than Broadway, 
and Tomkins Square more inviting than Union ? In the 
spring, when the March thaw has unlocked the accumulated 
dirt of the winter, and the whole city is deep in mire, which 
are the streets that a Democratic contractor first throws him- 
self upon ? Does he first remove the festering mounds of pol- 
lution that block the poor man's path to his home, and make 
thathome loathsome to him, and tJien betake himself to the 
coating of mud that soils the rich man's boots V Or does he 
leave reeking with abomination the crammed thoroughfares 
where Democratic voters live, half a hundred in a house, until 
every shovelful of dirt has been removed from the places where 
rich men reside, seven voters to a block ? But why ask idle 
questions ? It is the law of this world that the strong shall 
rule it. In a commercial city, the strong men are rich. Label 
your government what you will, it is the strong men in a com- 
munity who have their way ; and therefore, under all govern- 
ments, the streets where rich men live are clean. 

The plunder of the persons who are so unfortunate as to 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 23 

serve the public, and of those wbo aspire to serve the public, 
is systematic, and^ nearly universal. Our inquiries into this 
branch of the subject lead us to conclude that there are very 
few salaries paid from the city or county treasury which do 
not yield an annual percentage to some one of the " head- 
centres " of corruption. The manner in which this kind of 
spoliation is sometimes effected may be gathered from a narra- 
tive which we received from the lips of one of the few learned 
and estimable men whom the system of electing judges by 
the people ha« left upon the bench in the city of New York. 
Four years ago, when the inflation of the currency had so en- 
hanced the price of all commodities that there was, of neces- 
sity, a general increase of salaries, public and private, there 
was talk of raising the salaries of the fourteen judges, who 
were most absurdly underpaid even when a dollar m paper 
and a dollar in gold were the same thing. Some of the judges 
were severely pinched in attempting to make six thousand 
half-dollars do the work which six thousand whole ones had 
accomplished with difficulty ; and none, perhaps, more se- 
verely than the excellent and hospitable judge whose experi- 
ence we are about to relate. A person known by him to be 
in the confidence of leading men about the City Hall called 
upon him one day, and informed him that it was in contem- 
plation to raise the salaries of all the judges $ 2,000 per an- 
num. The judge observed, that he was much reUeved to 
hear it, for he had gone so deeply into the Sanitary Commis- 
sion and other projects for promoting the war, and had made 
so many expensive journeys to Washington in furtherance of 
such projects, that he did not see how he could get through 
the year if the inflation continued. " Well, Judge," said the 
person, " if the judges are disposed to be reasonable, the thing 
can be done." " What do you mean by reasonable ? " asked 
the judge. The reply was brief and to the point : " Twenty- 
five per cent of the increase for one year." The judge said 
no. If his salary could not be raised without that, he must 
rub on, as best he could, on his present income. The person 
was evidently much surprised, and said : " I am sorry you 
have such old-fashioned notions. Why, Judge, everybody 
does it here." Nothing more was heard of increasing tlic 
judges' salaries for a whole year, during which the inflation it- 
self had become inflated, and every door-keeper and copyist 
had had his stipend increased. At length, the spoilers deemed 
it best, for purposes of their own, to consent that the salaries 
of the judges should be increased $ 1 ,000 ; and, a year after 
that, the other $ 1,000 was permitted to be added. 

It was recently proved, in the presence of the Governor of 



24 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

the State, that the appointment of the office of Corporation 
Attorney was sold to one incumbent for the round sum of 
$ 10,000. This is bad enough, but worse remains to be told. 
Sworn testimony (from thirty-six witnesses), taken by a com- 
mittee of investigation, establishes the appalling fact, that ap- 
pointments to places in the public schools are systematically 
sold in some of the wards, — the wards where the public 
schools are almost the sole civiHzing power, and where it is of 
unspeakable importance that the schools should be in the hands 
of the best men and women. One young lady,- who had just 
buried her father and had a helpless mother to support, applied 
for a situation as teacher, and was told, as usual, that she must 
pay for it. She replied that she could not raise the sum de- 
manded, the funeral expenses having exhausted the family 
store. She was then informed that she could pay " the tax " 
in instalments. Another poor girl came on the witness-stand 
on crutches, and testified that she had paid $ 75 for a situation 
of $ 300 a year. Another lady went to a member of the Ring, 
and told him, with tears, that she saw no way of procuring the 
sum required, nor even of saving it from the slender salary of 
the place. The man was moved by her anguish, took compas- 
sion upon her, and said he would remit Ms share of " the tax." 
It was shown, too, that the agent of all this foul iniquity was 
no other than the principal of one of the schools. It was he 
who received and paid over the money wrung from the terror 
and necessities of underpaid and overworked teachers. We 
learn from the report of the committee that the jRing in this 
ward was originally formed for the express purpose of giving 
the situations in a new and handsome school " to the highest 
bidder " ; and, as the opening of the new school involved the 
discharge of a small number of teachers employed in the old 
schools, the Ring had both the fear and the ambition of the 
teachers to work upon. " There was a perfect reign of terror 
in the ward," says the report of the investigating committee. 
" The agent performed his duty with alacrity and with a heart- 
lessness worthy of the employers. It appears that he not only 
summoned the teachers to come to him, but that he called on 
their parents and friends as to the amount they should pay for 
their appointments, — the sums varying from $ 50 to S 600, 
according to the position sought." 

And who Avere the Ring that perpetrated this infamy? 
They were a majority of the Trustees elected by the people, 
and the School Conmiissioner elected by the people, — six 
poor_ creatures, selected from the grog-shop and the wharf, 
and intrusted with the most sacred interest of a republic, the 
education of its children. It was known before that in some 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 25 

of tlie wards the school trustees were drunkards ; it was known 
before that little children were piled up, like flower-pots in a 
greenhouse, in small, ill-ventilated rooms; but no one sup- 
posed, before this investigation in 18G4, that men could be 
elected to office who were capable of such revolting meanness 
as this. 

AVhen appointments are sold, appointments arc likely to be 
numerous. Some of our readers, doubtless, have smiled at the 
ridiculous catalogue of offices created to relieve the pecuniary 
straits of Louis XIV., and given by Voltaire in his history of 
the reign of that expensive monarch. In Paris, in the year 
1710, men holding the rank of counsellors of the king held such 
posts as hog-inspectors, inspector of calves, of wigs, and of 
slaughter-houses, inventory-draAvers, measurers of fire-wood, 
deputy measurers of fire-wood, pilers of fire-Avood, unloaders of 
fire-Avood, comptrollers of timber, markers of timber, charcoal- 
measurers, grain-sifters, comptrollers of poultry, barrel-gangers, 
barrel-rollei-s, butter-testers, beer-testers, brandy-testers, linen- 
measurers, unloaders of hay, and removers of boarding. Not 
that counsellors to the king performed any of these labors. 
That was done by underlings ; the counsellors to the king 
merely pocketing the greater part of the fees. But hoAV mild 
and trivial was their abuse of kingly poAver, compared Avith the 
hoards of superfluous officers that swarm in the public buildings 
of the city of New York ! In the office of the City Comptroller 
there are one hundred and thirty-one clerks. The Street 
Commissioner employs sixty. In the precious Manual de- 
scribed above, the reader, amazed at the interminable list of 
persons employed by the city, is every noAV and then puzzled 
by such items as these : twelve " manure-inspectors," at $ 3 
a day each ; twenty-tAvo " health-wardens," twenty-two " assist- 
ant health-wardens," twenty-tAVO " street-inspectors," all at 
$ 3 a day each ; seven " assistant inspectors of meat, at S 900 
per annum each ; seven " inspectors of encumbrances," at 
$1,250 each; twenty-two "distributors of corporation ordi- 
nances," at $ 2 each per day. We have not space to continue 
the catalogue. Who has ever seen any of these Avardens and 
inspectors ? A gentleman connected with the Citizens' Asso- 
ciation, last year, had the public spirit to sally forth. Manual 
in hand, in quest of the tAventy-tAVO health-wardens and tAventy- 
tAvo assistants ; for neither he nor the writer of these lines, nor 
any of their acquaintances, had ever so much as heard of the 
existence of such officers. Long and painful Avas the search. 
He found that those guardians of the public health Avere bar- 
keepers, loAv ward politicians, nameless hangers-on of saloons, 
who absolutely performed no official duty whatever except to 
2 



25 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

draw the salary attached to their places. They were the 
merest creatures of the worthless man who appointed them, — 
the man who sold or gave nway blank inierment-penniLs, signed, 
to favored undertakers, " to save them the trouble of coming 
down town every time they had a funeral." * For the benefit 
of those gentlemen of leisure in New York, who excuse their 
want of public spirit by saying that the city government is so 
coiTupt that it is of " no use to try" to reform it, we will men- 
tion that, very much through the exertions of the warden-hun- 
ter referred to above, those three twenty-two's were abolished 
a few months ago, as well as the entire department to Avhich 
they belonged. To that single item of reform we owe it that 
the city was not desolated by the cholera during the past sum- 
mer. 

The reader has, perhaps, heard something lately respecting 
the cost of " opening " new streets in the city of New York. 
Under cover of those innocent-looking words, incredible sums 
of money are stolen from the owners of real estate. In the 
year 1811, the entire island, except a small strip at its 
northern extremity, was surveyed ; the sites of all the future 
streets and avenues were settled, marked with stone pillars, 
and laid down on maps ; so that, ever since that time, all land 
has been bought, sold, held, and improved with reference to 
the streets that were one day to run through it, by it, or near 
it. The work was so well done that those maps, and no 
others, are still used by assessors of taxes, and for all other 
official purposes. Copies of them are to be found for refer- 
ence in one of the rooms of the building whereto all the world 
repairs every November to be taxed. Bearing these facts in 
mind, the reader will easily comprehend the audacity of the 
theft to which his attention is now directed. 

A new street is ordered to be " opened," and the judges of 
the Supreme Court appoint three commissioners to perform the 
work, at four dollars per day each. To " open " a street, in 
the legal sense, is not to go to work with shovel and pickaxe 
and convert a strip of meadow into a street, but merely to buy 
the strip from the owners, transfer the title to the Corporation, 
and then formally declare the street " opened." Since the 
surveys are already done, and the maps already made, and 
since the expense of the whole transaction is borne by the 
owners of land upon the' street, who bought that land because 
the street would one day exist, this legal "opening is the merest 

* This was the reason given by the undertakers when they were 
questioned on the subject by members of the new Board of Health. 
The possession of blanlc permits did not, however, prevent them from 
charging for the permits in their bills. 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 



27 



form. The commissioners buy the land required at the rate 
of one dollar for each lot taken, which is one among many 
proofs of the pure formality of the business. We will now 
state, first, what the three commissioners actually do who are 
so lucky as to have a street to open ; and then we will show 
what is charged for the arduous work. 

They meet in a room in the third story of a building in 
Nassau Street, which is from five to eight miles from the street 
about to be opened. They hire the room for the meetings of 
the commissioners. True, it is already occupied, and no change 
in it is made by the occupant ; but they hire it, nevertheless. 
They appoint a surveyor, a clerk, an assistant clerk, and some- 
times, we believe, a messenger. These appointments cost them 
three minutes of their valuable time ; for there are people who 
have acquired, in some way, a claim to those appointments, 
and are appointed as a matter of course. There is not, there 
cannot be, a doubt that the " understanding " between the 
judges, the commissioners, the surveyors, and the clerks is 
complete before the first step is taken. The clerk is the ruling 
mind of the affair. It is he who lets the room ; it is he who 
draws up the final report ; it is he who divides the spoil, and 
takes, probably, the largest single share. Pie conceives, ar- 
ranges, starts, and conducts the operation, and he does it at 
his ease in his own hired room. The officers being appointed, 
the commissioners have earned their four dollars each, and 
adjourn. 

Every day, between the hours of twelve and two, they visit 
the apartment, inquire after the health of their clerk, perhaps 
take a cigar with him, see that their names are entered as 
having attended, which entitles them to lour dollars, and then 
return, refreshed, to their private business. Meanwhile, sundry 
advertisements are published, announcing to parties interested 
what is going on. The surveyor may or may not take a car 
and ride up to the street, or walk over the part to be opened. 
Perhaps there is a house, built before 1811, which extends 
over the line of the street ; and if so, the owner is entitled to 
compensation. Usually, however, there is nothing of the kind ; 
and usually the surveyor, an old hand at the business, knows 
whetlier there is or not without going up to see. A draughts- 
man, meanwhile, has been copying a map of the street fi-om 
the maps of 1811 ; and the clerk writes along the border of it 
(from the tax-books) the names of the owners of the lots on 
each side of the street. Sundry other advertisements are 
then published, calling upon parties interested to come and 
see what has been done, and state objections, if any there are. 
The clerk then draws up a report, and the thing is done. None 



2g THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

of these operations are hurried. Care is taken of the interests 
of the commissioners. It is not until tliey have paid their 
noontide respects to the clerk for a prodigious number of days 
that the street is pronounced " open." 

Then the bill is presented. The surveyor charges as though 
he had made original surveys and drawn original maps. The 
clerk charges as though his report were the result of original 
searches and researches. The commissioners charge as though 
the opening had been the tardy fruit of actual negotiations. 
The rent of the room is charged as though it had been occu- 
pied wholly by the commissioners. And all of these charges 
are the very highest which any one, in his most lavish mood, 
could even think of in connection with the work supposed to 
be done. When we add, that half a dozen of these openings 
are frequently going on at the same time, in the same snug 
upper room, and conducted by the same individuals, the reader 
"will not be surprised to learn that the net result of the busi- 
ness to the master spirit, for the year ending June, 1866, was 
$ 25,466, of which sum $ 4,433 was charged for the rent of 
the room, which he hires for about $ 300 per annum, and $ 950 
was charged for " disbursements and postage-stamps." One 
surveyor's bill for the same year was S 54,000. It has been 
ascertained, after a laborious examination of the public records, 
that the total cost of " opening " twenty-five streets, or parts of 
streets, averaging less than half a mile each in length, was 
$257,192.12. The public is indebted for this information to 
Mr. AVilliam H. Whitbeck, president of an association of prop- 
erty-owners recently formed to protect themselves against 
further spoliation of the same nature. 

The Executive Council of the Citizens' Association has re- 
cently given publicity to a large number of facts relating to 
the same iniquity. We will select one of them : — 

" In opening 124th Street, the Commissioners awarded to the 
owner of a house standing in the northwest angle of 124th Street 
and Second Avenue some $4,500 for the damage to his building 
by the opening of the street. If this house had stood in the middle 
of the street, and had been entirely destroyed by the opening, he 
should not have received one cent, inasmuch as the house was built 
subsequent to 1811, when the map of the city w^as planned. The 
fact is, that, in 1811, a monument was planted at the intersection 
of 124th Street and second Avenue, and the person who built the 
house built it in the angle of the street, and facing the country 
road. The owner knew well where the street was to be, and so 
avoided huUding upon it. As the house was built feeing the angle, 
the two ends of its rectangular piazza extended about six feet over 
the line, the one end over the line of Second Avenue, and the other 
end over the line of 124th Street. Now, if the owner built his 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 29 

house encroacliing upon the street, he should not have been paid 
f'oi- the damage caused by liis own negligcuee. It a [.-fears, how- 
ever, that the piazza has been rounded so as not to exti nd over the 
line, and for this rounding of tiie piazza, which couhl have been 
done at an expense of certainly not more than $ 1,000, the owner 
has been ailo\ve(l the enormous sum of $4,500. The liouse stands 
there as good as it ever was. Need we say that the owner is a 
prominent politician i " 

We have since conversed witli the <;rentlem;in who was 
charged with the investigation of this case, lie assures us 
that the rounding of the piazza cost, In reality, about $ 250 ; 
and that he placed it at $ 1,000 in liis report, because, being 
ignorant of carpentry, he deemed It best to mention a sum 
much in excess of the proba'ole cost. 

Our lessening space w^arns us to forbear, tliough we have 
scarcely made an impression upon the mass of tacts before us- 
We cannot dwell upon the favoritism practised toward the real 
constitueats of the spoilers, — the bajuor-dealeii^, — wlio actu- 
ally paid a less sum per annum for licenses, and contributed a 
smaller amount to the Inebriate Asylum, than the liquor-deal- 
ers of Albany. We must pass by such enormous frauds as 
that known by the name of the Gansevoort swindle, in the 
course of which a tract of land was bought from the city at 
half its value, kept in costly litigation lor several years, then 
botight back by tije city for twice its value, and all the taxes 
remitted for the intervening period. Nor can we give details 
of the manner in which mean men steal li-om the price of the 
school-children's copy-books and slate-pencils, nor open up the 
enormous and complicated cheat which is covered by the word 
" stationery." How the hard-earned claims of poor laborers 
are " shaved," under pretence that there is no money to pay 
them in the treasury ; by what means a clerk of a market 
enjoys an income as large as that of the President of the 
United States; how the funerals of eminent men, the cele- 
bration of national festivals, and the return of scarred veterans 
from the seat of war have been made the occasion, first, of 
drunken revelry, and afterwards of wholesale plunder ; hoAv 
the delicate v/Ines provided for the sick in the public institu- 
tions are poured down the filthy gullets of many Avhose natural 
drink is distilled molasses; how the most valuable ferry leases, 
wharf privileges, and railroad charte;-s are given away or sold 
for a tenth of their value to " dummies " wiio represent the 
very men v/ho grant them ; how many men hold two or more 
ofiices at once ; and fifty otlier scandals into whicli we have 
looked, — we must pass by with this brief indication of their 
nature. It would be amusing to show the process by which 



30 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

(until honest Christopher Pullman stopped it last spring) the 
city was made to pay $87 every time the corporation granted 
permission to an old woman to keep a peanut-stand on a corner, 
for which she paid one dollar. As a portion of the " proceed- 
ings" of the two boards, the "resolution" had to he published 
in seventeen newspapers, and paid for in each, which cost the 
sum just mentioned. The same worthy gentleman has proved, 
by personal inquiry, that every rocket or firework discharged 
on the Fourth of July by order of the Corporation costs the 
city exactly twice as much as a private citizen pays for the 
same articles. 

The result of all this plunder is, that in thirty-six years the 
rate of taxation in the city and county of New York has in- 
creased from two dollars and a half to forty dollars per inhab- 
itant ! In 1830, the city was governed for half a million dollars. 
In 1865, the entire government of the island, including assess- 
ments on private property for public improvements, cost more 
than forty millions of dollars. In 1830, the population of the 
city was a little more than two hundred thousand. It is now 
about one million. Thus, while the population of the county 
is five times greater than it was in 1830, the cost of governing 
it is sixteen times greater. And yet such is the value of the 
productive property owned by the city, — so numerous are the 
sources of revenue from that property, — that able men of 
business are of the deliberate opinion that a private company 
could govern, clean, sprinkle, and teach the city by contract, 
taking as compensation only the fair revenue to be derived 
from its property. Take one item as an illustration : under 
the old excise system, the liquor licenses yielded twelve thou- 
sand dollars per annum ; under the new, they yield one million 
and a quarter. Take another : the Corporation own more than 
twenty miles of wharves and water-front, the revenue from 
which does not keep the wharves in repair ; under a proper 
system, they would yield a million dollars above the cost of 
repairs. 

We trust no reader of this periodical — not one — needs to 
be reminded that the money stolen by the thieves into whose 
hands the city has fallen is the smallest item of the mighty 
sum of evil resulting from the system. A person, hoAvever, 
must intimately know New York to realize what a welling 
i'oxxnt of moral pollution it is. Those within the circle of coi" 
ruption, and all with Avhom they continue "to have dealino-s, 
lose at length all sense of honor and shame, all power to dis- 
tmguish between rioht and wi'ong, and, finally, all knowledge 
that there is any difference between them. It is a most insid- 
ious thing. Many a good young man has been drawn into the 



CITY OF NEW YORK, 31 

system so insensibly that he has become an habitual stealer of 
the public money, almost without knowing it. Others are con- 
scious thieves, but not yet hardened beyond remorse. Some 
of these are, as it were, imprisoned in the system, and know 
not how to escape. A very larg-e number are morally non- 
existent, and has^e no other thought or occupation except to 
devise and execute schemes of spoliation. And we do believe 
that no man who serves, sells to, or buys from the city, and no 
man who tries to serve, sell to, or buy from the city, does en- 
tirely escape contamination. What a tale we could tell of one- 
notorious, but not naturally bad man, who, from a respectable 
though humble employment on tlie wharves, was lured into the 
low politics of his ward, and drank himself into such favor that 
he obtained, at length, the means of buying the privilege to 
steal as head of one of the departments, — and now, his place 
being abolished, and all his ill-gotten gains squandered in vice 
and ambitious schemes, slinks out of view, ftxtally diseased, and 
bereft of hope ! But this part of our subject we leave to our 
readers' own reflections, and we rejoice to know that it will 
fare better there than it could in these pages ; for, truly, the 
moral harm which this system is now doing in New York, and 
to the country through New York, is something which baffles 
and eludes written language. 

The question now occurs. How was it that a city containing 
so many public-spirited and honorable men fell into the control 
of a gang of thieves ? 

It has all come about in one generation. Within the mem- 
ory of men still living, the affairs both of the city and the State 
of New York were so well managed that other States and cit- 
ies were glad to copy their methods of doing public business. 
The time was when men, after a brilliant career in Congress, 
regarded it as promotion to be Mayor of the city ; when a seat 
in the city legislature was the coveted reward of a lifetime of 
honest dealing in private business ; when a seat in the State 
Legislature was the usual first step to the highest places in the 
national government ; when the very ward committees were 
composed of eminent merchants and lawyers ; and when even 
to serve as secretary to a ward committee was a feather in the 
cap of a bank-teller or head book-keeper in a great house of 
business. In other Avords, the time was when the citv was 
governed by its natural chiefs, — the men who had a divine 
right to govern it. Nay, more : it was once a distinction to be 
a voter, — since none could vote who were not householders. 
None could vote who had not given their fellow-citizens some 
evidence of an ability to vote understandingly, and some indi- 
cation of a disposition to vote correctly. The particular test 



33 



THE G0VERN3IENT OF TEE 



selected we do not admire ; and all we can say in favor of it 
is that it was better than none. It did exclude the great 
mass of ignorance and vice ; it did admit the great mass of 
intelligence and virtue ; it did answer the purpose in a re- 
spectable degree. 

Tliis system was changed by the Constitutional Convention 
of 1821, which abolished the household restriction, and admit- 
ted to the polls all citizens, native and foreign, except con- 
victed criminals and madmen. Among those who opposed 
this fatal change was Martin Van Buren ; and all the dire con- 
sequences of it which lie predicted have come upon the city. 
He said it would utterly corrupt the politics of New York, by 
giving it over into the hands of ten thousand ignorant or 
vicious men, whose votes could not be overcome. It would 
" drive from the polls all sober-minded people," from mere 
despair of effeciing any good by voting. It would take away 
one powerful motive to virtue by abolishing the distinction 
between voters and non-voters. To be a voter, said Mr. Van 
Buren, is now " the proudest and most invaluable attribute of 
freemen." It was one of the rewards of industry and self- 
control. A proud day it was to a young mechanic, when he 
left his new home and his newly married wife, and walked, for 
the first time, to the polls to deposit his vote. It stamped him 
a respectable man. He was thenceforth a full-iledged citizen, 
one of the masters of the city, the rulers of which were his 
servants ; and they knew it, and treated him accorvlingly. Mr. 
Van Buren's remonstrances were not heeded, and the old sys- 
tem was abolished. 

The evil consequences did not immediately appear, because 
the habit of selecting respectable men for the public service 
survived the system which had created that habit. The reign 
of Andrew Jackson, which debauched the national govern- 
ment, developed rapidly all the tendencies to corruption latent 
in the government of the city. A lower grade of men were 
elected to office, and a grade still lower worked the machinery 
by which they were elected. Still, there was no system of 
stealing. A defalcation occasionally occurred : aldermen 
sometimes pocketed bundles of cigars from the " tea-room " ; 
others contrived to convey their tlunilies to evening parties at 
the expense of the city; otliers may sometimes have criljbed 
an odd half-ream of paper or a box of pens ; and, doubtless, 
there was some jobbery, and much favoritism, as there is in all 
governments. Honesty, liowever, continued to be the rule in 
the public service. We mean, that, although the politics jf 
the city Avere debased, and the men elected were always de- 
preciating, there was no thouo;ht among them of usino- their 



CITY OF NEW YORK. ^,3 

places as conveniences for plimderinjr their constituents. As 
late even as 1850 an alderman or chief of a department would 
have actually lost standing with his fellows if suspected of 
taking a bribe or of having a concealed interest in a contract. 
Yes, even in 1850, but sixteen years ago, it was a disgrace to 
steal the people's money on any pretext. If any one liad then 
foretold that the time was at hand v/hen the only men in the 
city government despised and snubbed by their equals would 
be the few who did not steal, no man could have beheved the 
wild prediction. 

About the year 1850, when it began to be perceived that 
omnibuses could no longer convey the morning and evening 
multitudes of people, and when street railroads in many ave- 
nues were projected, the Corporation conceived the fancy that 
they had the right to grant the privilege of laying rails in the 
public streets to private companies. In fact, it Avas taken for 
granted on all hands that this was their right ; and it \<fA?, in 
connection with those railroad grants that the corruption, on 
a great scale, began. It was then that the low, immature, 
ignorant, unprincipled, irresponsible, untaxed persons v/ho 
formed the majority of the city legislature discovered that an 
alderman could, by a Ju;licious use of his opportunities, not 
merely get a good deal of money, but make his fortune, dur- 
ing a single term of service. '•'• liings " were then first 
formed; "agents" were then first employed, — the myste- 
rious go-betweens who have to be " seen " before anything can 
be done. The necessity for this macliinery was soon per- 
ceived ; for, at first, some sad mistakes occurred, v/hich threat- 
ened for a time to spoil the game. One company, for ex- 
ample, distributed forty thousand dollars among tlie Aldern-icn, 
but were outbid, and the grant was given to another company. 
Naturally enough, they demanded their money back ; but 
many of the poor creatures had already squandered their 
shares, and were totally unable to i-efund. One of the dc- 
frau(h;d men, as it chanced, was a member of the grand jury, 
and he announced his determination to bring the matter be- 
fore that boily. Means v/ere Ibund to satisfy his claim ; about 
one half the whole sum was given up, and the rest was paid 
in promises that have never been fuihlled. New-Yorkers re- 
member the ancient, familiar firm of Kipp and Brown, formerly 
blazoned on the gorgeous sides of coujitless omnibuses. j\'Ir. 
Solomon Kipp, tli'e head of that firm, used to say tlint lie per- 
sonally expended fifty thousand dollars in "getting throrigh " 
the two comparatively unimportant railroad grants in v.'hich 
he vvas interested. >Ye have the alEdavits of other })arties 
before us, which justify the conclusion that, from this single 



„. THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

source, the Corporation corruptly gained a round million in 
about ten years. 

Thus the system of spoliation beo;an. Thus was the cu- 
pidity of the politicians inflamed. From that time to this, 
the ordinary New York politician has regarded public office in 
no other light than as a chance to steal without the risk of the 
penitentiary. It is not that tlie city government, so far as 
controlled by politicians, sometiuies steals. We do not make 
that charge. We say it does nothing but steal; for even the 
most useful or necessary public work is sanctioned by it only 
so far as it affords promise of gain to politicians. 

At the present time, as we are informed by one whose op- 
portunities of knowledge are unequalled, all the political con- 
cerns of the city are controlled by about seven men, — heads 
of city departments and othei-s. In most of the wards, a nom- 
ination to office by the party which is ludicrously styled Dem- 
ocratic insures an election by the people ; and it is these 
seven men who work the machinery by which Democratic 
nominations are ground out. They are the power behind the 
ballot-box, greater than the ballot-box itself Candidates for 
Congress, for the State Legislature, for the numerous boards 
of city legislators, must pass the ordeal of their inspection, and 
pay their price, before their names can go upon the " slate " ; 
and such is the absoluteness of their power over ignorant 
voters, that they have caused to be elected to Congress by 
Irish votes a man who, as editor of a " Know-No thing " news- 
paper, had been employed for seven years in vilifying Irish- 
men and their religion. They have taken up a man who com- 
manded one of the companies of artillery that marched from 
the field of Bull Run because their " time was up," and, while 
the whole civilized world was pointing at him the finger of 
scorn, elected him to one of the most lucrative offices in the 
United States. Of late years, these lords of the town have 
had the deep cunning to give a few of their best appoint- 
ments and several minor offices to Republicans, as part of 
their system of preventing investigation. This was a master 
stroke. Most of the publishers of newspapers were already 
bribed to silence by the Corporation advertising, and all the 
reporters were hired not to report anything disagTceable by 
the annual gift of two hundred dollars. This letting in of 
a few RepubHcans to share the spoils completed the system 
of repressing inquiry. They have known, too, how to turn 
to account the feud between two Republican leaders, wliich, 
after distracting the politics of the State of New York for 
many, years, has transferred the battle-ground to Washington, 
and now threatens to snatch from the nation the fruits of its 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 35 

victory over rebellion, or at least to postpone its enjoyment of 
them. 

Such are some of the consequences that ha^e resulted from 
admitting to the polls unqualified and untaxed men, in a city 
which catches and retains the worst of the foreign emigration, 
and where there are seven foreign-born voters to every five 
native. In aSTew York, we actually see the state of things 
contemplated by Daniel AVebster in his Pittsburg speech, 
vfhC^n he asked, " Wlio would be safe in any community where 
political power is in the hands of the many, and property in 
the hands of the few ? " Such an unnatural state of things, 
he added, could nowhere long exist. Political power in the 
city of New York is in the hands of seventy-seven thousand 
foreign voters and fifty-two thousand native voters ; while the 
great bulk of the property of the city is owned by about fif- 
teen thousand persons. Political power in New York simply 
means the power to steal with impunity the property of those 
fifteen thousand persons. This stealing does not take the 
form of open and indiscriminate spoliation, because it can be 
more conveniently done, and longer done, through the ma- 
chinery of politics. 

Having now stated as fully as our limits permit the condi- 
tion of the government of the city, it remains for us to do 
what little we can towards pointing out the remedy. In con- 
sidering this })art of our subject, modesty and hesitation would 
become the wisest and ablest of men. It is no time to dogma- 
tize and declaim, when the dearest interests of civilization are 
to be rescued from imminent and deadly peril. Next year, 
we trust, there will be a convention assembled to revise the 
Constitution of the State of New York, and upon the action 
of that body we hang all our hope of speedy and radical re- 
form. If any one, therefore, has so much as a single well- 
weighed suggestion to offer toward a practicable plan, now is 
the time for^him to offer it. On this great and most difficult 
l^roblem every person in the State of New York who is so 
liappy as to have a thinking head upon his shoulders should 
now liabitually meditate and converse. 

Patchwork will not answer That has been tried, and 
found insufficient. AVhile the ship is still on the ocean, it is 
well to stop the leak with anything that will even slightly 
diminish the risk of death. But the' thing now in order is to 
go into dock, and overhaiil the hull from keel to taffrail, or 
perhaps to abandon the vessel and build a new one. It is so 
exceedingly important for us all to understand this, that we 
will pause here a moment to mention a few of the expedients 
for checking thievery which have signally failed. All mere 



36 



THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 



expedients have fjiiled, or are failing. Nothing will ever 
stop it but some system, the natural working of which will 
put into olliee a control!. ng number of honest men. 

The total failure of" the contract system is a case in point. 
To check jobbery and favoritism, it was en;icted several years 
ago tha<" all work done for the city, and all commodities sup- 
plied to the city, greater In value than $ GOO, should be the 
subject of contracts, to be awarded after due notice to the 
lowest bidder. The contract system, so far from putting an 
(3])stacle in the way of corruption, has furnished facilities for 
It. ^Ve have the sworn testimony before us, that it is com- 
mon for fictitious bids to be sent in, for genuine ones to be 
bought off, and for parties who are best prepared to do the 
work required to be kept in ignorance of the proposals. Large 
iron contracts, for example, have been awarded before any 
one of the great iron firms have been aware that such con- 
tracts were in the market ; and they have been awarded to 
men who never melted a pound of iron nor had any means 
Avhatever of doing the work. To a pork-butcher w;is assigned 
the contract for building a very costly bridge over a wide 
river ; and the dIfH'-ult work of grading an avenue, hilly and 
rocky, has been awarded to a politician ignorant of the most 
rudimental engineering. We have before us a successful bid 
for supplying the city oilices with stationery. In which v/e find 
the bidder olfering to supply " blue folio post" at o)ie. cent per 
ream; "magnum bonum pens," at one cent per gross; "lead 
])enciis," at one cent per dozen ; " English sealing-wax," at 
one cent per pound ; and eighty-three other artick\s of sta- 
tionery, at the uniform price of one cent for the usual parcel. 
This vras the ''lowest bid," and it was, of course, the one ac- 
cepted . It appeared, however, when the bill was presented 
^ov payment, that the particular kind of paper style;! " blue 
iblio post" had never been called for, nor any considerable 
(piantity of the other articles proposed to be supplied lor one 
cent. No one, strange to say, liad ever wanted " magnum bo- 
num " pens at one cent a gross, but in all the ofHces the cry 
had been lor " Perry's extr-a fine," at three dollars. Scarcely 
;;ny one had usCd '• envelopes letter-size" at one cent per hun- 
dred, but there liad be.m countless calls for " envelopes note- 
size" at one cent each. Between the paper crdled "blue 
folio post," at one cent per ream, and the i)aper called " fools- 
cap extra ruled," at live dollars and a half, the difference was 
too slight to be perceived ; but every one had used the fools- 
cap. Of what avail are contracts, when the oiHcIals who 
award them, and the other olliclals v/ho pay the 1)111, are in 
league with the contractor to st^al the public uioney V 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 



yj 



To prevent one of the most couimon kinds of theft, it was 
enacted that every person who presented a bill to the city 
should take an o;ith belbre receiving his money, that he had 
not paid, and would not pay, any ])art of it to any one for get- 
tii5g him the work. Tiiis law is shamelessly evaded every day. 
A school commissioner orders vv^ork of a printer, telling him 
to be sure to charge a good round price. The work is done, 
the bill presented, the oith t?dven, the money paid. A few 
days after, that commissioner or his ti'iend has some printing 
of his own to be done, wliich the ju-lnter does, and sends with 
the work a receijited bill. ^Ve can produce a printer who has 
upon his books .$10,000 worth of work done grails, in recom- 
pense for services rendered in procur.ng him city jobs. When 
the procurer of the work has no occasion ^xo': printing, it is 
usual for him to horrow sums of money of the printer, which, 
like Dr. Johnson's sixpence, are •' not to be repaid." Many 
of these petty politicians are, in fact, universal '' dead-heads," 
and prey on all the town. One remark which we chanced to 
hear from one of them was exceedingly suggestive. " Pull- 
man," said a young Councilman to our honest friend Christo- 
pher, " what did you want that Harlem Railroad grant re- 
scinded for?" He alluded to the grant of the privilege to 
lay rails and run cattle trains through the handsomest street 
in the upper part of the inland, in the teeth of the most vehe- 
ment opposition on the part of the residents, " For my part," 
continued the virtuous youth, " there is no company I would 
sooner give my vote to than the Harlem. If I ask 'em to take 
on a hand or give a place to a friend, they 're sure to do it. 
There 's not a more obliging eonipr.ny in New Yoric than the 
Harlem." The Harlem Railroad Company, reader, is Mr. 
Cornelius Vanderbilt, one of the ablest men of business now 
living. The Councilman whose words we have (juoted woukl 
not be em})loyed by him in any post recpiiring average skill 
and honesty. *^ And'^yet, behold the great, strong mui courting 
the favor of the weak, little one \ Do we blame either of 
these men ? We arraign only the system wdiich puts them in 
false and corrupting relations with 6ach other and v/ith tlieir 
fellovz-citizens. 

It was lately enacted, tliat a three-fourths vote of both 
l)oards~the Aldermen and Counc'dmen— shouhl be recpiisite 
to pass any bdl granting or paying money. This was done 
b-L'CPiuse tliere was always a Democratic majority in both 
b :;:ir'.is. and that majority'was always corrupt. ]>ut it didnot 
e^•en retard the profuse voting of money. It merely required 
the Ring to buy up or bully a few more members, which was 
done in^ week, and the work went on as bravely as belbre. 



38 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

The present board of Councilmen began their term of service 
with thirteen Republicans and twelve Democrats, owing to 
special exertions on the part of reformers. Those thirteen 
Republicans were elected, at great expense, for the sole 
purpose of outvoting the thieves, and they were all solemnly 
pledged so to do. But the system repels men of strong and 
tried honesty, and consequently seven of the thirteen speedily 
fell into the toils. Some were purchased, others were intimi- 
dated, othei-s were persuaded, but all yielded alike to the 
behests of the Ring. And, really, we cannot wonder at it. 
The six faithful members of the board are useless to their con- 
stituents. The most just, the most necessary measure pro- 
posed by them^ is voted down as a matter of course. A young, 
inexperienced Councilman sees, on the one hand, the favor of 
his colleagues, the smiles of the City Hall, the freedom of the 
city's stores and shops, places for his friends, and $7,000 a 
year ; and, on the other, the frowns and surly opposition of 
his colleagues to everything he asks or proposes, a warfare 
against nefarious schemes which he knows to be useless, and 
which the public neither applaud nor hear of. For his brother, 
no easy clerkship is created ; for Ids second-cousin's benefit, no 
great man discovers that he is in need of a fourth assistant 
messenger; and if a carman in his ward loses a hoi*se through 
a hole in a wharf, and justly calls upon the neglectful city gov- 
ernment to buy him another, it is enough for him to introduce 
the bill for it to be voted doAvn. Can we wonder that so many 
immature persons yield to a temptation so insidious, and which 
addresses itself to so many of the weak places in human nature 
at once ? 

Another well-meant expedient has completely failed. Owing 
to the lavish expenditures, it invariably happens that many of 
the sums appropriated for specific objects are exhausted long 
before the end of the year. For example, in 1865, the comp- 
troller estimated the cost of printing and stationery at $145,- 
000, and the Legislature of the State granted $1G0,000. But 
the amount expended in that year was $31 0,324. This excess 
would have presented difficulties to ordinary financiers, but 
none to those who control the finances of New York. For- 
merly, the deficit was supplied by " transferring " the money 
appropriated to other objects. "Transfer the wise it call." 
But tills device having been forbidden by legislative enact- 
ment, parties interested sued the city for the amount of their 
claims ; and, having obtained judgment against tlie unfortunate 
city, went through tlie form of seizing the portraits and fur- 
niture of the Governor's room in the City Hall. Then a 
judicial decision was obtained, which declared that judgments 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 39 



ao-ainst the city " must be paid " ; and, sheltered by this de- 
cfsion, the city treasurer paid them. In the year 1864, the 
amount of the judonients paid from the public treasury was 
$1,262,398. Last winter, a new expedient was devised to 
prevent this impudent evasion of a most proper and necessary 
law. It was enacted that no amount in excess of a specihc 
appropriation should be recoverable by judgment. By what 
audacious trick this enactment will be set at naught has not 
yet appeared ; but that it ivUl be set at naught we have little 
doubt. If it is not, it will be only owing to the vigilance^ and 
tact of the public-spirited lawyers who are lending the aid ot 
their talents to the Citizens' Association. 

As these minor expedients have failed of their object, so, we 
believe, the grand expedient of all — the transfer of the control 
of the city government to the State Legislature — is not to be 
relied on for the future. That expedient, false m principle, 
was justified only by the urgent necessity of the case, lo 
that temporary transfer of power from a completely corrupt to 
an Incompletely corrupt organization, we owe it that the city 
of New York is still, in some degree, inhabitable. J^or ten 
years past, nothing has stood between the city and universal 
spoliation, except the Governor of the State and a small 
number of intelligent. Incorruptible members ot the l^egis- 
liture. To them we owe the rescue of the police trom 
the control of city politicians; and to the police, thus 
rendered efficient, we owe the deliverance of the city from 
rapine during the riots of 1863. For twenty-four hours, until 
adequate assTstance arrived, they kept the mob m cj^eck by 
their discipline, courage, and rapld.t.y. No one can tell wha 
would ha^4 occurred, or what would not, if we had then had 
for policemen creatures appointed to serve the mean purposes 
of the mean men whose character we have been exhibiting 
and wlio were in the fullest sympathy with brother sa.-ages 
torturing our prisoners captured in war. To the Legislature 
also, we are indebted for a tolerable adnnnis ration of the 
affairs of the Central Park, of the Health Board, and of some 
other departments now controlled by honest men appointed at 

"^ O'n the other hand, the interference of the Legislature has, 
at leno-th reduced the city government to a condition of poht- 
t^l^. Thl^^^^ov has been deprived of all controlling 
powe • The Board of Aldermen, seventeen m number, the 
Bc^ard of twenty-four Councllmen, the twelve Supervisors, the 
i:venty-one members of the Board of Education, ai-e so many 
independent legislative bodies, elected by the People. Te 
police are governed by four Commissioners, appointed by tho 



40 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

Governor for eight years. The charitable and reformatory 
institutions of the city are in charge of four Commissioners 
Avhoni the City Comptroller appoints'for five years. The Com- 
missioners of the Central Park, eight in number, are appointed 
by the Governor lor five years. Four Commissioners, appointed 
by the Governor lor eight years, manage the Fire Department. 
There are also five Commissioners of Pilots, two ajipointed by 
the Board of Underwriters and three by the Chamber of Com- 
merce. The finances of the city are in charge of the Comp- 
troller, v/hom the people elect for four years. The street 
department has at its head one Commissioner, who is ap- 
l)ointed by the j\Iayor for four years. Three Commissioners, 
appointed by the Mayor, manage the Croton Aqueduct depart- 
ment. The law officer of the city, called the Corporation 
Counsel, is elected by the' people for three years ! Six Com- 
missioners, appointed by the Governor for six vears, attend to 
the emigration from foreign countries. To these has been 
recentl}' added a Board of Health, the members of which are 
appointed by the Governor. Was there ever such a hodge- 
podge of a goveniment before in the world ? And nowhere is 
there any adequate provision for holding these several powers 
to their responsibility. Consequently, although the svstem of 
jjlunder has now been in operation for sixteen years, durino- 
whicli the public thieves have stolen not less than fifty million? 
of dollars, not one man of thein has ever been punished, nor 
even made to disgorge. 

There i^s a still more terrible objection to governino- the city 
of New York at a city one hundred and sixty miles distant 
from it. The Legislature itself is corrupt. The same seven 
men who control t^ie politics of the cifv nominate the city 
members of the Legislature ; and these, reinf >rced by corrupt 
men from other cities, control one branch of the Legislature 
and are powerful in the other. Sometimes the city leaders 
cause theuKelves to be elected to the Legislature ; but usually 
tney select, irom the clerks in the public offices, their own 
creatures, — mindless, dependent men, whose only virtue is a 
cur- ike fidelity to their masters. No language can overstate 
the hopeless incapacity of these men for the business of le-is- 
lition. 1 hey can only vote as they are ordered ; and if you wish 
o buy their votes, you must arrange the prlce,-not with tliem, 
i'ut tiieir owners m New York. Toelect such men to the Leo-Igl 
in tiirc IS on y to transfer power from the Legislature to the lobbv. 
mere at Albany we see, within the raits of the Assemblv "a 
crov^^tl of poor, ignorant, irresponsible clerks; and in the lobby 
wc find nien representing Cornelius Vanderbilt, the Centr/l 
ivauroad, the Lrie Railroad, the Astor estate, and many other 



IS 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 41 

men and companies controlling vast resources and carrying 
great prestige. Moreover, the agents representing these strong 
men and powerful organizations are persons of skill and audac- 
ity. When such a reversal of the natural order of things 
exists, and when the members of the Legislature are paid by 
the State a less sum per diem than their board costs, — to say 
nothing of drink and billiards, — what must be the result ? 
We need not say. 

A very able lobby agent, who has been in the business many 
years, has given us an inkling of the mode of procedure. 
" When we get to Albany," said he, " we make out our lists, 
and, after studying them and comparing notes, we classify 
members, and make an estimate of what it is going to cost to 
get our bills through. We find out about how much each man 
expects, and who is running him. Then we arrange the thing 
in New York with certain people, whose consent is necessary. 
The price for a vote ranges from fifty dollars to five hundred, 
unless it is that of the chairman of a committee. He wants 
more, because he has to appear on the record as originating 
the mea,sure." 

It was probably one of these originating gentlemen who 
could explain the testimony given recently in an Albany cor- 
ruption case by a lady who proved herself a true helpmeet to 
her husbantl. She testified that a lol)by agent called at her 
house one Sunday afternoon, when there was " some conver- 
sation " respecting the accused Senator, which the court " ruled 
out." She continued thus : " The next morning I put S 2,500 
in greenbacks into a yellow envelope, and gave it to my only 
son, eleven years old. The boy got into the wagon \<\X\\ his 
father. / never saw the money again." 

Jf there is in this world a man who can be truly said to 
hnoiv anything, Mr. Thurlow Weed knows the Legislature of 
the State of New York. His testimony respecting the corrup- 
tion in that Legislature, as given in the " Daily Times," a few 
months ago, is as follows : — 

" Formerly the suspicion of corruption in a member would have 
put him ' into Coventry,' while knowledge of such an offence would 
have insured the expulsion of the offender. Now ' bribery and cor- 
ruption ' prevail to an extent greater than existed in the worst days 
of the Parliament of England, v/herc, happily for l^ngland, the 
]>raciic8 has been ]-eformed, as it must be here, or corru]»tion will 
undermine the government. No measure, however meritorious, es- 
capes the attention of ' strikers.' Venal members openly solicit ap- 
pointment on paying committees. In the better days of legislation, 
when no unhnvful motive existed, it was considered indelicate in a 
member to indicate to the Speaker any preference about committees. 
The evil has been growing, each year being worse than the pre- 



42 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

ceding, until reform is sternly demanded. Could the secret history 
of the present Legislature be exposed to the public gaze, popular 
indio-nation would be awakened to a degree heretofore unknown. 
In the Assembly everything was struck at. Not even a religious 
charity found exemption. The sources of rapacious corruption 
were the Assembly Railroad Committee, and the Committee on 
Cities and Villages. I say this upon reliable authority, to correct 
the ' Tribune ' and the ' Times,' in both of Avhich journals this 
Legislature is commended for its integrity. That there were hon- 
est and honorable members in both houses, by whose integrity and 
firmness much bad legislation was arrested, is true. The Senate, 
fortunately, presents an inflexible majority of upright members ; 
while in the House, the Ring was formidable enough to put through 
Avhatever paid or promised to pay liberally, in defiance and derision 
of the efforts of an honest minority." 

Mr. Weed says, that not even a religious charity found ex- 
emption. We can confirm that assertion. A committee of 
benevolent ladles went to Albany last winter, and asked the 
Legislature to give them S 20,000 in aid of an institution for 
the nurture and education of children who lost their fathers in 
the war. They said in their petition, that, after having been 
compelled to refuse admission to two hundred children of slain 
soldiers and sailors, who had no one left on earth to care for 
them, they had resolved to try and erect a larger building, for 
which purpose they proposed to raise $ 20,000, and asked the 
Legislature to double the sum. Even this holy charity the 
shameless villains " struck at." An agent of the Ring called up- 
on the ladies, and said, in the plainest Enghsh, " Pay me 
$ 2,000, and you can have half the sum you petition for ; pay 
me $ .5,000, and you have the whole." Th'3 poor ladies, con- 
fronted for the first time in their lives Avith the extreme of hu- 
man depravity, knew not what to think of this proposal, nor 
what to say to the man who made it. Anxious for their or- 
phans, and far from their natural advisers, they were on the 
point of yielding, when the husband of one of them came to 
the rescue, and urged them not to taint their infant enterprise 
"with the leprosy of corruption. They were reluctant to give 
up the aid so urgently needed, but they did do so at last. 
Later in the session, the Ring, finding that nothing could be 
got from them, allowed the honest minority to carry a bill 
giving them $ 5,000. This narrative we received from the 
lips of the estimable and distinguished lady who headed the 
deputation. 

It is such facts as these which convince us that the Legisla- 
ture, as now elected, cannot be trusted for the future govern- 
ment of the city. The reform must be radical. It must begin 
at the bottom, with the voters, and work its way up. The 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 43 

Citizens' Association — a body of eminent merchants, lawyers, 
and men of leisure, united for the sole object of reforming the 
government of the city —have proved,' by most costly^and 
laborious experiment, that the majority, long controlled by 
the plunderers, cannot be shaken from their devotion to them. 
By needless interference with the Sunday usages of the Ger- 
mans, as well as by some wise and just restrictions upon the 
selling of liquor, the friends of reform have rendered the great 
grog-shop interest a unit for the corruptionists, and that inter- 
est can send to the polls twenty-five thousand votes. By very 
great exertions, an honest man can be chosen Mayor ; for there 
is still in New York a small majority of the whole number of 
voters who will vote as they ought, if the issue is clear between 
honesty and corruption. But in the wards and districts in- 
habited chiefly by ignorant foreigners and vicious natives, the 
case is hopeless. Printed matter cannot reach them. They 
arc untrained in the duties of citizenship. A prodigious num- 
ber of them have some small interest in maintaining the system 
of plunder ; for from the stolen millions flow numberless rills 
of lawless or excessive gain ; so that the city is like an Italian 
farm irrigated by the dirty waters of a pestilential stream. 
They pay no tax. Since their share of the taxation is paid by 
them in the form of rent, it is the " extortionate landlord " 
whom they blame when their rent rises, in five years, from six 
dollars to twelve dollars a month, for two little rooms. They 
never think of going round to Councilman O'Rafferty's grog- 
shop, or Assemblyman Tooley's desk in the Comptroller's 
Office, or Supervisor McShaughnessy's market-stand, and 
berating them lor cutting down their children's allowance of 
fresh meat and Christmas toys. It has been found impossible 
to make them see any connection between their pinching rents 
and the reckless votes of a man who has promised one of their 
relatives the place of seventh assistant door-keeper to the 
scavenger's ofhce. The thing has been faithfully tried, and 
found impossible. What honest men print they cannot read, 
what honest men say they will not hear. 

In view of the expected Constitutional Convention, we beg- 
to offer for consideration the following suggestions. 

No man should be deprived of the right of suffrage who now 
legally possesses it. The State must fulfil its compact to the 
end, cost what it may. 

But no man, native or foreign, should henceforth be admit- 
ted to the suffrage who cannot read English composition of 
medium difficulty. More than that the State has no right to 
demand. Its right to exclude persons who cannot read arises 
fi'om the fact that such persons are dependent upon others for 



44 THE GOVERNMENT OF THE 

the informauon without which an intelligent vote cannot be 
cast. Such a rule, applied to the city of New York, would 
exclude not less than fifteen thousand votes ; and this alone 
would give the city back to its legitimate owners, tlie virtuous 
and industrious portion of its inhabitants. This alone Avould 
do it ! 

No man should be allowed to vote at any city or State elec- 
tion who has not paid a direct tax ; and that tax should vary 
with the whole amount to be raised. It would cost about 
twenty millions a year, for many years to come, to govern, 
tame, and teach Manhattan Island. Suppose the voters' tax 
were thirty cents per million dollars of the levy. Then, if the 
city were honestly governed, a workingman's tax would be $ 6 
a year. But if stealing should raise the levy to forty millions, 
it would by Sl2. Now, the difference between S6 and $12 
to a man who earns $ 15 a week is such that he would be very 
likely to ask his representativer what it meant, which is the 
very result to be desired. 

The system of governing the city of New York at Albany 
should be abandoned as soon it can be safely done. If the 
city cannot govern itself, it must learn how to do it ; and 
there is no way of learning how to do a thing except by 
doing it. 

No officers should be elected by the people except the Mayor 
and the members of the city legislature. The people are puz- 
zled and confounded on election days by long lists of candi- 
dates, whose names they never heard before. To ask the mass 
of voters to select a corporation counsel, a sheriff, a comptrol- 
ler, a judge, is self-evident absurdity. 

The distinction between the city of New Y'ork and the county 
of New York, with all its costly train of consecjuences, should 
be abolished. 

Longer terms of service for Mayor, Aldermen, and Council- 
men would, perhaps, be desirable. The appointments to all 
minor offices should be permanent. No creature should be in- 
trusted with the unlimited power of removal. If the city 
would be well served, it must treat its servants so that men of 
honor and capacity will be found to serve it. A man of honor 
and capacity will not hold his livelihood at the mere mercy of 
another man. 

There must be a decided increase of many salaries. Men 
capable of managing the finances of a great city, men fit to 
control any of the departments, cannot be induced to forego 
their chance of ibrtune in private business by salaries no greater 
than those paid to bank-tellers and book-keepers. A rich man 
of respectable talents may occasionally be induced to serve as 



CITY OF NEW YORK. 45 

Secretary of the United States Treasury for a sum per annum 
less than modest housekeeping costs in Washington. It is in- 
sanity to pay him such a sakry, it is true ; but then the honor 
counts ibr something. In a commercial city, business is done 
on business principles ; and if a $ 20,000 man is wanted, 
% 20,000 must be paid for him. It is not just salaries that 
burden any people ; it is stealing that does that. On the other 
hand, an officer who holds his oIHce until proved to have mis- 
behaved in it need not be paid the salary justly due to one 
whom a breath unmakes. 

Somew^here in the system of city government there must be 
a power, a court, a something, independent and disinterested, 
before which an officer accused of misconduct or incapacity 
can be arraigned promptly and fairly tried. 

It might be well that the Board of Aldermen should be com- 
posed of men who pay a tax upon $ 5,000 worth of real or per- 
sonal estate. With a taxed and restricted sulfrage, this safe- 
guard against prolusion might not be necessary ; but if the 
suti'rage remains unrestricted and untaxed, some provision of 
this kind will have to be adopted. 

These are some of the ideas which have occurred to us, and 
we offer them for consideration, with sincere deference to those 
who are versed in the art of governing. It is an arduous task 
which the people of New York have before them, and it will 
task both their wisdom and their patience to the uttermost. It 
will be difficult to dislodge the public thieves. It was difficult 
to take Richmond. But the taking of Richmond and the 
capture of the Reljel army were not more essential to the 
triumph of the United States over its enemies, than the reform 
of the government of New York is to the crecbt and spread of 
free institutions throughout the world. We have all heard of 
revivals of religion. Why may we not look for a great and 
glorious revival of public spirit ? There .are, indeed, indica- 
tions that such a revival has begun. We hear of several 
instances of men of leisure who are awakening to the truth 
that there is a nobler way of using the gift of leisure than in 
looking out of a club window, or in collecting valueless rarities, 
or in printing exactly one hundred copies of antiquated trash 
upon " large paper." The existence of an organization so re- 
spectable and determined as the Citizens' Association is a sign 
of promise, and we hope to see its efforts sec;on le 1 by other 
societies. Dr. Franklin mentions that, sever d monrhs bt-ibre 
the meeting of the Constitutional Conventicm of 1787, clubs 
and societies were formed ibr the purpose of exchm^ing 
opinions and gathering knowledge relating to the sc ence of 
government. One of them met weekly at his own house, 



46 THE GOVKRXjIKNT OF THE 

when papers were read and discussed, and questions were pro- 
posed for consideration during the week. Why not have a 
dozen such in every ward this winter ready to co-operate with 
the Citizens' Association ? The " Tribune," which has hon- 
orably distinguished itself by giving unrelenting publicity to 
schemes of spoliation, and the " Times," which has exposed 
much of the interior working of the system, and holds no 
parley with the thieves, — both, we are assured, are ready to 
lend their columns to the work of reform. Whatever any club 
may be able to expose or suggest, that is of the requisite brevity 
and importance, will find ready access to the public through 
those great journals. 

We have been obliged in this article to limit ourselves to a 
single feature of the misgovernment of New York, — the 
steaHng of the public money. There are departments of the 
system into which we shrink from casting a glance. To some 
of these corrupt men are entrusted the pauper, the sick, the 
criminal, the insane. It is their duty to guard the myriads of 
the virtuous poor against the rapacity which builds for them 
habitations that are unsafe and pestilential. Think what the 
government of such a city might be and do, what noble insti- 
tutions it might found, what grand experiments undertake, 
what beautiful edifices construct, what merit employ and re- 
ward ! The legislature of the city, composed of men eminent 
in business, in science, and in benevolence, — the men first in 
their several spheres, — would rank high among the great par- 
liaments of the world, and contribute powerfully to its advan- 
cing civilization. The city of New York abounds in able and 
honest gentlemen, in every sphere of life. On just condi- 
tions, they can be won to the public service. Why can we 
not have them ? 

And let no one suppose that this is a subject which concerns 
the people of New York only. It concerns us all. Not only 
has every American citizen an interest in the welfare and 
honor of his country's chief city, but the evils under which 
New York suffers exist, to some degree, in many other towns, 
and threaten all of them. New York, as we have said, is a 
sieve which lets through the best of the emigration that comes 
to our shores, but catches and retains the worst ; and therefore 
it is in that city that the system of unqualified suffi-age has 
been ^/\s/ put to a test under Avhich it has broken down com- 
pletely and hopelessly. But in all our large cities there is of 
necessity an assemblage of ignorant, irresponsible, and thought- 
less men, totally incapable of performing the duties of citizen- 
ship. We accordingly find in Brooklyn, Philadelphia, Bos- 
ton, New Orleans, San Francisco, Chicago, Albany, Roches- 



CJTY OF X/:\V YORK. 47 

ter, Buflfalo, St. Louis, and many other cities, the insidious 
beginnings of that misgovernraent which has made New York 
the by-word and despair of the nation.* New York, too, is 
suffering vicariously for her sister cities. As it has been her 
destiny to suffer most from the evils of ignorant and untaxed 
suffrage, so it is her duty to wrestle first with those evils, and 
apply a remedy which shall be radical, final, and universally 
imitable. She will perform that duty. She is performing it. 
No city of equal size on earth contains so great a mass of pub- 
lic spirit and administrative capacity, and we feel persuaded 
that the time is near at hand when those great qualities will 
be successfully exerted in rescuing the metropolis from the 
hands of the spoilers who have stolen into possession of it. 

It looks now as though one half of civilized mankind were 
going henceforth to live in towns; and it appears to us that 
in the laying out, the decoration, and government of towns 
America has shown a particular talent. How full of all pleas- 
antness are the villages of New England, with their gardens 
and lawns, their tidy fences and spotless houses, their ample 
streets, and their mighty elms waving over all. What other 
land can show towns so vigorous and handsome as Nashville, 
Cleveland, Detroit, Buffalo, Rochester, and fifty others that 
will occur to the reader ? What a spirited thing it was in 

* During the prevalence of the cholera last summer, an appalling 
glimpse was given the public of the interior of a jail in the city of 
Brooklyn. An eyewitness wrote: "The cholera there resulted from 
over-crowding the cells. The ventilation is bad, the air offensive, the 
food, pork, beans, bread and molasses; and when the late intensely hot 
and debilitating weather is taken into account, it should be a matter 
of wonder that every one was not stricken down. The criminal 
courts adjourned from June until October, and to my knowledge there 
are many there too poor and friendless to get bail, that will be 
able to prove their entire innocence when put on trial. To keep 
these persons in over-crowded cells with broken-down drunkards, 
whose svstems were fitted by long habit for disease, would be little 

better than murder A panic existed that no imagination can 

conceive. Terror was in every face. In one cell, an Englishman in 
collapse, rising up and falling down convulsively, his cell-mates 
running round almost distracted; in another, a corpse about to be 
removed. Two little bovs, waiting to go to the House of Refuge, 
were screaming at the top of their voices from fear; a drunken man 
singing a maudlin song in a corridor; men in the halls, with their 
faces to the gratings, trying to breathe fresh air, for fear of inhaling 
contagion. Several others, with symptoms of approaching cholera, 
were expecting death. If all the prisoners could be kept in the jail 
until they dropped off one by one, there might be some sense in it, 
apart from its inhumanity. But the jail supplies the almshouse, the 
penitentiary, the workhouse, and, in many instances, the lunatic 
asylum, with inmates. Prisoners are first usually taken there before 
being sent to those institutions." 



48 GOVERNMENT OF NEW YORK CITY. 

Yermont to commission younp; Larkin Mead to adorn her Cap- 
itol with a statue of Ethan Allen ; and in Cleveland, to com- 
memorate Perry's victory by one of the finest out-of-door mon- 
uments in the world ; and in Tennessee, to crown the heights 
of Nashville with a State-House of unequalled elegance and 
solidity; and in marvellous Chicago, three times to raise the 
entire city for the sake of better drainage, and to bore far out 
under Lake Michigan for pure water ! How good it was in 
great Boston to put it within the reach of all her boys and 
girls to learn how to swim, and of all her men and women to 
practice the art! This was one of those fine details of civili- 
zation Avhich are only reached after the great essentials have 
been realized and become habitual. New York, too, might 
boast, even amid her blushes. The Central Park was a noble 
gift to posterity; the Croton Aqueduct was a truly Roman 
thought ; and all the islands, — are they not covered with pub- 
lic institutions, nobly planned ? We can truly say, that the 
people of the United States have shown an aptitude for orderly 
and elegant arrangement. They know how to make their 
towns and cities fit abodes for civilized beings, and they mean 
to make them such. 

But the spoiler must be expelled, or he will spoil all. Hon- 
est men possess all the true, trustworthy intelligence there is 
in the world. Yillains of talent there may be, but no wise 
villain, still less a villain of public spirit. The thieves must 
be driven out, if it costs a bloody war ; and it icill cost a 
bloody war if they are not. 



Cambridge : Stereotyped and Printed by Welch, Bigelow, & Co. 



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